Certain things about Word97 just annoy the heck out of me. This page is a collection of things I do to Word's condifiguration to work around the most annoying things. This page will probably be updated from time to time, as I get annoyed with a feature and find a way to kill it.

Automatic conversion of certain text to hyperlinks

Microsoft, in their attempt to force-feed the Internet and hot links into every corner of every product, has made the program look for text you're typing which might be a hot link, and reformat those on the fly as clickable links. This is at times really annoying, especially when preparing documents which are for paper display only. To fix this "feature," go to the "Tools/AutoCorrect"menu choice. This brings up a dialog box. Under both the "AutoFormat" and "AutoForat As You Type" tabs, there's a check box for "Internet and network paths with hyperlinks." Uncheck these, and Word is much less annoying.

Auto-capitalization of the first letter of a "sentence"

While I'm sure many folks enjoy this feature, in which Word automatically makes sure you use your capitals correctly, there are times when this is not desirable. When documenting programs, for example, it is necessary to list variable names or constant names exactly as they appear in the program. Microsoft makes this hard by changing these strings without asking. To turn off this feature, go to the "Tools/AutoCorrect" menu selection, and a dialog box is displayed. Under the "AutoCorrect" tab, turn off the check box for "Capitalize first letter of sentences."