Complete / True Word count for MS Word Thread poster: KMPrice
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KMPrice 
Canada
Local time: 16:35
French to English
Did you know that MS Word does not count words within text boxes and other Word elements? It just dawned on me recently! (ok, so I'm a little slow sometimes
Just do a 'Select All' in Word, and you'll see - none of your text in Text Boxes is selected.
I just had a trans full of text boxes, did a word count with MS Word which gave me 3,098, recounted it with this little utility I found, and it gave me 3,65... See more Did you know that MS Word does not count words within text boxes and other Word elements? It just dawned on me recently! (ok, so I'm a little slow sometimes
Just do a 'Select All' in Word, and you'll see - none of your text in Text Boxes is selected.
I just had a trans full of text boxes, did a word count with MS Word which gave me 3,098, recounted it with this little utility I found, and it gave me 3,650 - a difference of 552 words.
Thanks to sheer frustration and Google, this is where I found the solution:
http://www.shaunakelly.com/word/CompleteWordCount/
Note that when you save the file from the site in IE, it will automatically try to save it as a .doc file - just change it to .dot and follow the rest of the author's instructions.
I did a manual count (ran an individual count of each text box in Word, then added those totals to Word's count of the whole doc) to make sure this utility works properly, and it does.
I sent her a note of thanks, and she wrote:
"Thanks for your email. I'm glad you found the utility useful. I originally did it for academics and students who had strict word limits to comply with. I never thought it might be useful for translators!"
And she gave me permission to post her link here. Drop her a note of thanks if you find this helpful and tell her you're from Proz - I'm sure she'll be pleased! ▲ Collapse
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Hello Karen,
This is a problem that has always bothered me as well. It is a big hassle to do separate word counts of all the text boxes. I usually end up just using the count that Word gives, even though I know it should be more.
What an excellent tool! I already tried it out, and it works great!
Thanks for taking the time to post this. I also sent my thanks to Shauna.
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Endre Both
Germany
Local time: 01:35
English to German
| Thanks Karen | Jan 15, 2004 |
I too was rather surprised when I discovered this nasty little secret of Word.
Since then I have moved on to translation software that offers correct counts, so this is not an real issue any more to me. Still, this is a nice utility, thanks for sharing it (and for asking the author first!).
Best wishes
Endre
EB Communications
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| Nifty little tool! | Jan 15, 2004 |
Thanks so much for posting this - it is indeed a very useful little add-on!
Kerstin
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Monika Coulson
Local time: 17:35
Member (2001)
English to Albanian
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SITE LOCALIZER | Thank you Karen | Jan 15, 2004 |
Dear Karen,
thank you for sharing this with us. And I will drop Shauna a thank you note right now. Have a great day,
Monika
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| Excellent tool | Jan 15, 2004 |
Though I use my Translation Memory tools for counting words in MS Word, it's good to have a reliable tool for double checking.
Thanks Karen!
Romuald
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Bill Greendyk
United States
Local time: 19:35
Member (2002)
Spanish to English
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| Great, Karen! | Jan 15, 2004 |
I recently did a job where the word count seemed awfully low, and it turned out that MS Word hadn´t counted the words in the text boxes. I counted them "manually", but now I won´t have to any more. Thanks again!
Cheers,
Bill
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Edward Potter
Spain
Local time: 01:35
Member (2003)
Spanish to English
+ ...
| Informing Microsoft | Jan 16, 2004 |
The severe limitations of the MS-Word counting tool is well known among us translators. My question is if any of us here have informed Microsoft of this purchase-discouraging shortcoming of their product. We translators often are forced to go use someone else's software to get an accurate word count. How about informing Microsoft of some of these threads on Proz.com?
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KMPrice
Canada
Local time: 16:35
French to English
TOPIC STARTER | Word and other limitations | Jan 16, 2004 |
Hi Edward,
I always scour the newsgroups when I find shortcomings in Windows or other MS products, to see if other folks have the same problem and what solutions there may be. There are usually a few knowledgeable people (MS employees?) in the Windows support forums who post replies regarding known issues, along with a Windows update link if a fix/patch does indeed exist.
But overall, from what I've read from others, getting in touch with MS directly about a missing or ... See more Hi Edward,
I always scour the newsgroups when I find shortcomings in Windows or other MS products, to see if other folks have the same problem and what solutions there may be. There are usually a few knowledgeable people (MS employees?) in the Windows support forums who post replies regarding known issues, along with a Windows update link if a fix/patch does indeed exist.
But overall, from what I've read from others, getting in touch with MS directly about a missing or poorly-functioning feature (and having them do something about it) is easier said than done.
That being said, here's another useful tool I found, that blows away Windows' search function:
http://www.mythicsoft.com/agentransack/default.aspx
I recently had to search for a text string in a folder of 20 html files. Windows' search found 3 files containing the string. Agent Ransack found 12.
Ta-da! (and it's free, too)
Edward Potter wrote:
The severe limitations of the MS-Word counting tool is well known among us translators. My question is if any of us here have informed Microsoft of this purchase-discouraging shortcoming of their product. We translators often are forced to go use someone else's software to get an accurate word count. How about informing Microsoft of some of these threads on Proz.com? ▲ Collapse
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Heinrich Pesch
Finland
Local time: 02:35
Member (2003)
Finnish to German
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| There's a macro for character count and word count | Jan 16, 2004 |
In an older thread last year one colleague offered a macro for MS Word, which works well. I use it always for files with textboxes.
Copy and past from here:
Sub Charactercount1()
Dim Charactercount As Long
Charactercount = ActiveDocument.BuiltInDocumentProperties(wdPropertyCharsWSpaces)
For Each ashape In ActiveDocument.Shapes
If ashape.TextFrame.HasText Then
Charactercount = Charactercount + ashape.TextFrame.TextRange.ComputeStatistics(Statistic:... See more In an older thread last year one colleague offered a macro for MS Word, which works well. I use it always for files with textboxes.
Copy and past from here:
Sub Charactercount1()
Dim Charactercount As Long
Charactercount = ActiveDocument.BuiltInDocumentProperties(wdPropertyCharsWSpaces)
For Each ashape In ActiveDocument.Shapes
If ashape.TextFrame.HasText Then
Charactercount = Charactercount + ashape.TextFrame.TextRange.ComputeStatistics(Statistic:=wdStatisticCharactersWithSpaces)
End If
Next ashape
MsgBox ("The document has " & Charactercount & " characters with spaces")
End Sub ▲ Collapse
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