How to recover text from any Word for Mac or Excel for Mac file

This article explains what the "Recover Text from Any File" converter is and how to use it to recover damaged documents.

What is the Recover Text from Any File converter?

The Recover Text from Any File converter allows you to extract the text from any file. The file does not have to be a Word file.

What will I lose using the Recover Text from Any File converter?

Using the Recover Text from Any File converter does have its limitations. Document formatting will be lost, along with anything that is not of a text nature. Graphics, fields, drawing objects, and so on, will not be converted. However, headers, footers, footnotes, endnotes, and field text, will be retained as simple text.

My document is damaged: How can I recover the information?

Microsoft Word 98 Macintosh Edition provides a converter for recovering the text from any file.

Note When you change the Files of type box to Recover Text from any File in the Open dialog box (on the File menu, click Open), Word will 'remember' this setting and will use it the next time you open a document. To avoid this problem, reset the Files of type box back to Word Document (*.doc) after you have completed recovering your document.

To use the converter on a Word file, follow these steps:

1. On the File menu, click Open, and then click the document.
2. In the List Files Of Type box, click Recover Text from Any File, and then click Open.

To use the converter on any non-Word file in Microsoft Word 98 for Mac or in Microsoft Word 2001 for Mac, follow these steps:

1. On the Tools menu, click Preferences.
2. Click the General tab.
3. Click to select the Confirm conversion at Open check box, and then click OK.
4. On the File menu, click Open.
5. Click the file you want to recover, and then click OK.
   
   The Convert File dialog box appears.
6. In the Convert File dialog box, click the Recover Text from Any File converter, and then click OK.

To use the converter on any non-Word file in Microsoft Office XP for Mac or in Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac, follow these steps:

1. On the File menu, click Preferences.
2. Click the General tab.
3. Click to select the Confirm conversion at Open check box, and then click OK.
4. On the File menu, click Open.
5. Click the file you want to recover, and then click OK. The Convert File dialog box appears.
6. In the Convert File dialog box, click the Recover Text from Any File converter, and then click OK.

Word will convert the damaged document and recover any text from the document.

What does the "...Attempt recovery now" message mean?

When Word detects that there is a damaged document to be recovered, Word displays the following message: This message is displayed when an automatically recovered file is present but Word is unable to recover it. When you start Word, Word finds the document and asks if you want Word to try to recover it.

If you click No, Word will not attempt to recover the document, and the document will be permanently lost.

If you click Yes, Word will attempt to recover the document. If Word is successful in recovering the file, save the document as a normal Word document.

"Recover Text from Any File" doesn't appear in the Convert File dialog box

The Recover Text from Any File converter is not installed. You will need to run Office Custom Install to install this converter.

1. On the Microsoft Office CD-ROM, double-click the Office Custom Install folder.
2. Double-click the Microsoft Office Installer icon.
3. Click Custom Install in the list at the top of the window.
4. Click the triangle tab next to Converters and Filters.
5. Click the triangle tab next to Text Converters.
6. Click to select the Recover Text Converter check box, and then click Install.

The Recover Text Converter is installed in the following location: