weird symbols

funny symbols when using Oxford WordSmith Tools

1. Check your text files. Read them in Notepad. Do they contain lots of strange symbols? These may be hidden codes used by your usual word-processor. Solution: read them into your usual word-processor and Save As, with a new name, in plain text format, sometimes called "Text Only" or .txt.

2. Choose Texts, highlight the text file, and before pressing OK, press View. Does it contain strange symbols? Solution: change Text Settings; try going from one of the DOS character sets to Windows or vice-versa. The text was clean ASCII but Oxford WordSmith Tools thought it was Windows ANSI.

3. Funny symbols in a word list may well also be caused by mis-spellings in the original text files.

Greek, Russian, etc.

4. If the text is in Russian, Greek, etc. you will need an appropriate font, obtainable from your Windows cd or via the Microsoft website.

5. If you have several lists open which use different character sets, and you change Font or Text Characteristics, the lists will all be updated to show the current font and character set, unless you first minimize any window which would be affected.

funny symbols when reading WordSmith data in another application

Oxford WordSmith Tools can Save or Save As and Saves as text" by printing to a file. "Save" and "Save As" will store the file in a format for re-use by WordSmith. This format is not suitable for reading into a word processor. The idea is simply for you to store your work so that you can return to it another day.

"Save as Text", on the other hand, means saving as plain text, by "printing" to a file. This function is useful if you don't want to print to paper from WordSmith but instead take the data into a spreadsheet, or word processor such as Microsoft Word. It is usually quicker to copy the selected text into the clipboard.