If you haven’t had a computer hard drive kick on you, or never have had a document go sour, you aren’t blessed. Your time will come.

Common sense, now that’s another story. There’s no app for that.

When I was in college 15 years ago, I learned about document corruption the hard way. You’ve heard a similar story, or even have had your own: I had a 25-page final paper due, and, as usual, I was pushing the deadline, frantically working to get it finished in time for class. A sage once told me to save every three minutes, so that’s what I did.

When I inserted my floppy (!) in the school PC for printing, the computer could not open the file. The floppy was corrupted. Thing is, I didn’t save a copy on my home hard drive; I simply worked on the diskette. This was my only copy.

I eventually recovered about 65 percent of my document — after hours of repairing the diskette sector by sector.

Thankfully, today’s technology offers dozens of methods to ensure our work isn’t lost — Google Docs, Dropbox, plain-jane e-mail attachments, vast backup drives, etc. Even if work is corrupted, recovery options abound. (Common sense, now that’s another story. There’s no app for that.)

Below are a few document recovery tips that could mean the difference between getting home on time for dinner and pulling a lonely all-nighter. Clip and save.

1. Open and Repair: Word 2002, 2003, 2007

By Matt Mahoney

If you open a file and notice something’s amiss, or you simply cannot open the file at all, there might be a problem with the structure of the file itself. This is referred to as “corruption.” It is a generic term used to describe files that are no longer working correctly. If you think your file is corrupt, give the Open and Repair utility a shot. It might save you from having to recreate the entire file.

Starting the process is slightly different depending on your version of Word.

Word 2003 and 2002:

1. Click the File menu.
2. Click Open.
3. Navigate to the file and select it, but do not double-click to open it.
4. Notice the drop-down arrow on the extreme right side of the Open button. Click that to reveal options.
5. Choose “Open and Repair” to attempt to repair the file.

Word 2007:

1. Click the Office Button.
2. Click Open.
3. Navigate to the file and select it, but do not double-click to open it.
4. Notice the drop-down arrow on the extreme right side of the Open button. Click that to reveal options.
5. Choose “Open and Repair” to attempt to repair the file.

If there are any errors, Word will repair them automatically and give you a list of the errors. All you need to do is click the Close button on that window and save the file to make the repairs permanent. If there are no errors, Word will open the file normally, and you might need to examine other reasons for the file not working as expected.

Note: This option does not exist in Word prior to Office XP (2002).

2. Open and Repair: Excel 2002, 2003, 2007

By Matt Mahoney

If you open a file and notice something is amiss, or you simply cannot open the file at all, there might be a problem with the structure of the file itself. This is referred to as “corruption.” It is a generic term used to describe files that are no longer working correctly. If you think your file is corrupt, give the Open and Repair utility a shot. It might save you from having to recreate the entire file.

Starting the process is slightly different depending on your version of Excel.

Excel 2003 and 2002:

1. Click the File menu.
2. Click Open.
3. Navigate to the file and select it, but do not double-click to open it.
4. Notice the drop-down arrow on the extreme right-side of the Open button. Click that to reveal options.
5. Choose “Open and Repair” to attempt to repair the file.
6. Choose Repair.

Excel 2007:

1. Click the Office Button.
2. Click Open.
3. Navigate to the file and select it, but do not double-click to open it.
4. Notice the drop-down arrow on the extreme right-side of the Open button. Click that to reveal options.
5. Choose “Open and Repair” to attempt to repair the file.
6. Choose Repair.

You will be given two options: Repair or Extract Data. The repair option should be used first. Excel will attempt to automatically repair the file. If there is corruption, Excel will let you know that it repaired what it could. If there is no corruption, then your file will open normally, and something else could be causing the trouble. Hopefully, after repairing, the file should work as expected. Save the file and continue your work.

The Extract Data option should be used if the Repair option did not fix the corruption. This will strip all formatting from the file, removing many other elements as well. You are usually just left with the raw data and formulas. This is a last-resort option, as it often requires a lot of time reapplying formatting and other elements such as charts. Sometimes this is the only way you can open certain files, unless you have a working backup copy.

Note: This feature was not available for Excel prior to Office XP (2002).

3. Saving the Majority of a Corrupt File (Word 2000, 2002, 2003, 2007)

By MaryHazel McDermott

Have you ever experienced a file behaving strangely? Some symptoms you might have experienced include:

• a relatively small file taking a long time to save
• a file with odd formatting
• a file that doesn’t allow editing
• a file that has been through a computer crash while open

These are only a few, and none of these is a sure sign that a file is corrupt; each might be caused by something else or have nothing to do with the file’s behavior or appearance.

If you have one of the newer versions of Word (2002, 2003, 2007) you should try Open and Repair first. This method is discussed in another tip. If Open and Repair fails to detect any corruption, the following method may save you from hours of frustrating work to recreate the file.

1. Visually check your file for anything that appears wrong.
2. Turn on the hidden characters in Word by pressing Ctrl+Shift+*.
3. Look for the last pilcrow (paragraph mark) in the document and place your cursor to the left of it (sometimes it is best to skip the last word in the document as well).
4. Press Ctrl+Shift+Home to select all the text from the cursor to the top of the document.
5. Press Ctrl+C to copy the text.
6. Open a new blank document.
7. Press Crtl+V to paste the text into the new document. Do not be surprised if some or all of your formatting is missing; this is expected. Do not use the Paste Option to keep source formatting as this may introduce corruption.
8. Check your document to see if you have at the least most of the text.
9. Save the file with a new name.
10. Test to see if the file behaves properly when performing the actions you were initially attempting.

If the above method does not work on the majority of the file’s contents, then try the same method on the first half of the document. If that part is fine, copy half of what remains and add it to the portion that is working properly. If that part is not working, then copy half of what you copied the first time and test it. Continue adding or dividing half of the remaining text until you cannot get any more text that works properly. This method is called the Rule of Halves.

If you find a specific portion of a document that is damaged, try recovering text below it into a separate new document. When using the Rule of Halves, always save to a new file name. Once you have recovered everything you can, do not forget to delete the interim copies.

4. Recovering Text from Any File (Word 2000, 2002, 2003, 2007)

By Russ Hatton

Have you ever tried to open a file but could not, no matter which program you tried? Or have you ever had a file that was so damaged that all you cared about was avoiding retyping everything? If you answered yes to either question and have exhausted all other options, including checking with an IT professional, then a little-known feature in Word may help you.

The “Recover Text from Any File” option can often open a document that has been damaged or is a file type that Word cannot normally open. Keep in mind that all formatting, images and objects will be rendered as text. Also, the first thing you will see will be text referring to formatting; review all the text for anything useful, then delete what is not useful and save the document with a new name.

Method one — Recover Text from Any File option:

Word 2003, 2002, 2000:

1. Click the File menu and choose Open.
2. Click the “Files of type” drop-down list and choose “Recover Text from Any File.”
3. Select the file and click Open.
4. Examine the results.
5. Use Save As to save the file with a new name.

Word 2007:

1. Click the Office Button and choose Open.
2. Click the “Files of type” drop-down list and choose “Recover Text from Any File.”
3. Select the file and click Open.
4. Examine the results.
5. Use Save As to save the file with a new name.

Method two — Notepad option:

1. Open Notepad (found in the Accessories group under Programs on the Start Menu).
2. Click the File menu, browse to the file, and click Open.
3. Examine the results (although you will lose all formatting, you might be able to salvage some or all of the text).
4. Save the file with a new name.

Note: You can also use a variation of this method from Windows Explorer. Browse to the file, right-click on the file icon and choose Open With, select Notepad, do not put a check in the box that says “Always use the selected program to open this kind of file,” and click OK.♦

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Jenny Sweeney How To document corruption, Dropbox, Excel, floppy diskette, Google Docs, Word