NBSP in Word, part 2

This is a follow-on to my previous post on the subject.  These are my notes as I’m working, so they don’t read very well as text 🙂 .

Another test, on a different file exhibiting the same problem:

In the UI:

• Removed all the new-style equations (OMath objects)
• Changed all OpenType fancy features to defaults (in the Character Properties)
• Changed the proofing language for all text to English

In word/settings.xml:

• Removed FELayout
• Removed all w:compat/w:compatSetting except for [@w:name=”compatibilityMode”]
• Left m:mathPr for now, but I may remove that another time. Edit: I removed that below.

Did `find . -name \*xml | xargs grep -il asia`.  That gave me word/{document,numbering,settings,styles}.xml.

Used XML Notepad 2007 to move tags onto their own lines — just open the file, then save it.

settings.xml: it was w:themeFontLang.  Leaving that in for now.

styles.xml: It’s a bunch of <w:lang/> and <w:rFonts/> (`grep -i asia word/styles.xml |sort|uniq|less` is my friend!).  Leaving them in for now.

numbering.xml: Again, just <w:rFonts/>.  Leaving them for now.

document.xml: There were two lonely <w:rFonts/> tags!  Those I left in at first.

Zipping it

I tried using 7z, both from the context menu and with `7z a -tzip -mm=Deflate -mx=0 ../draft8e.docx *` (7z command-line options reference).  However, Word 2013 didn’t like either.  I used Send To | Compressed Folder, and that was OK.  A problem for another day.

More changes

Result?  Still no luck.  Time to strip the rFonts!

1. Remove the rFonts referencing asia (/asia/g, in fact) from document.xml.  Result? No luck.
2.  Remove that pesky m:mathPr from settings.xml.  You know, I wonder…  Result?  No luck.
3. Remove w:themeFontLang from settings.  In styles, leave w:val, but remove w:eastAsia and w:bidi.  Result: success!!!!

So if you do all of the above, you’ll probably be OK 🙂 .

Edit 2017/11/02

More discussion of this issue, in a LibreOffice context.  Apparently Word 2016 has gone back to fixed-width NBSPs.  I hope it is still fixable!  I will probably have 2016 by the end of the year and will post updates then.