Word 2010 macro stops execution after opening a file

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I have a macro run from one file that opens a second file, checks it for a property, then activates the first file and does some stuff.

It was working on one machine, but when transferred to another machine, it stops executing after opening the second file, and the cursor pops to the top of the macro.

Does the same thing (ie stops executing) whether I execute from the VBA editor or by chosing the macro from the list. Does the same thing whether I step through or just run.

Does the same thing whether I allow users to pick a file using the file dialog or specify the file path in code.

Word 2010.

Ideas?

I already tried rebooting and reimporting, just in case there was some file corruption someplace.

Thanks,

Jessica

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Can you share the code so we can see what the problem might be? Depending on how the code might be written, it is possible that the ActiveDocument changing as a second file opens is what is causing the problem.

Where does the code itself reside? Is that document remaining open throughout the macro running phase?

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The code resides in a template that remains open throughout execution. As soon as the second file opens, the macro stops executing. If the second file is already open, the macro works. Is there a way to open the second file without making it the active document?

Here it is:

Code:

Sub ReplaceFromTableList2()
Dim ChangeDoc as Document
Dim RefDoc As Document
Dim cTable As Table
Dim oFind, oReplace As Range
Dim I As Long
Dim wasTracking As Boolean
Dim sFname As String
 
Dim dlgOpen As FileDialog
Set dlgOpen = Application.FileDialog(FileDialogType:=msoFileDialogOpen)
   
    With dlgOpen
        .Filters.Clear
        .Filters.Add "Word Files", "*.docx"
        .AllowMultiSelect = False
        .Show
        On Error Resume Next
        sFname = .SelectedItems(1)
    End With
    On Error GoTo 0
   
    If sFname = "" Then
    MsgBox "You didn't pick a file"
        Exit Sub
    End If
 
'sFname = "H:MacroscorrectionTable.docx"  ' tried it with this statement rather than the file picker; didn't work either
wasTracking = ActiveDocument.TrackRevisions
'Define the document to be processed
Set RefDoc = ActiveDocument
 
'Open the document with the changes
Set ChangeDoc = Documents.Open(sFname)
' quick check to make sure it is a good doc
If ChangeDoc.Tables.Count = 0 Then
    MsgBox "There are no tables in the document you picked"
    ChangeDoc.Close wdDoNotSaveChanges  'close the bad doc
    Exit Sub
End If
'Define the table to be used
Set cTable = ChangeDoc.Tables(1)
 
'Activate the document to be processed
RefDoc.Activate
ActiveDocument.TrackRevisions = False
replaceUnderline
ActiveDocument.TrackRevisions = wasTracking

For I = 1 To cTable.Rows.Count
 
     'Define the cell containing the word/phrase to be replaced
     Set oFind = cTable.Cell(I, 1).Range
  
     oFind.End = oFind.End - 1  ' get rid of the table cell end marker
 
     'Define the cell containing the replacement word/phrase
     Set oReplace = cTable.Cell(I, 2).Range
      
     oReplace.End = oReplace.End - 1  ' get rid of the table cell end marker
     
     With Selection
 
          'Start at the top of the document
          .HomeKey wdStory
 
          'Replace the words/phrases
          With .Find
               .ClearFormatting
              ' .Replacement.ClearFormatting
               .Execute findtext:=oFind, replacewith:=oReplace, Replace:=wdReplaceAll, MatchWholeWord:=True, MatchWildcards:=False, MatchCase:=True, Forward:=True, Wrap:=wdFindContinue
          End With
     End With
Next I
ActiveDocument.TrackRevisions = False
unreplaceUnderline
ActiveDocument.TrackRevisions = wasTracking
 
'Close the document with the table
ChangeDoc.Close wdDoNotSaveChanges
end sub

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Jessica

Your code is almost there. You have named both documents so that part is taken care of but then you go back to using ActiveDocument and Selection which gets confusing.

For starters – move Set RefDoc earlier in the macro to avoid confusion
Then remove all mentions of ActiveDocument and replace with either ChangeDoc or RefDoc depending on what you want to achieve.

Next, change the macro replaceUnderline to work with a passed in document rather than what it is currently doing (you didn’t post that code). This means that particular macro should change along these lines
Sub replaceUnderline()
With ActiveDocument…..
…..
End Sub

changes to
Function replaceUnderline(aDoc as Document)
With aDoc…
…..
End Function

Finally, get rid of the selection object and replace it with a range. The selection object is unclear when we don’t know which document is active.

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Thanks, Andrew! I

bet it worked on the other machine because I had fewer documents open and they all had the same template. For production I am going to isolate this routine in its own template and train the technical writers to switch templates temporarily or load an add-in. I’m lucky in that the other tech writers on hand are savvy enough to do that.

Anyway, I can make those code changes, and remember to avoid Selection when I can.

For what it’s worth, the replaceUnderline and unReplaceUnderline bits substitute unlikely strings for the underline character. It turns out that Word thinks that “OPS__detra” is a single word. The brute force way of stopping that was to temporarily eliminate underlines in the doc.

Is there another way to tell Word not to treat _ as a separator? Of course I need it to still treat periods, commas, colons, question marks and semicolons as separators.

– Jessica

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