When you insert a picture “from file” into a Word doc, you get a pop-up screen that has a preview window in it. Is there a way to disable the preview?
Whenever I use the insert picture from file function and go to a directory where a large number of pictures are stored, the program nearly grinds to a halt. Even if I am not highlighting the files that list in the lefthand window, my PC bogs down to the point where I don’t get response from the slider bar. It is almost as if Word is generating a preview for every image file in that directory as soon as I open the directory.
What version of Word are you using? Mac or Windows?
In Word 2002 for Windows, in the Insert Picture dialog box, you would click the down arrow next to the Views icon in the top toolbar and deselect “Preview.”
Thanks. I didn’t know where to turn off the preview. Unfortunately, after running a little experiment, that doesn’t decrease the wait time, or improve the responsiveness of the dialog box while in a directory full of images.
Open the Insert Picture window. You’ll see a row of small icons on the top side. One of the icons reads “Views”. Click on the little black arrow that is on the right of the “Views” icon. You 'll see a drop down menu with several options. You probably have “Thumbnails” selected, which causes the problem. I suggest to use “Details” instead.
That improved the drag time by maybe 10%, 20% to be really generous. It seems to be taking a very long time to decide which files in the directory are image files.
It’s still a painfully long wait while my system thinks things over.
Are there shortcuts to missing items, or shorcut or drive letter assignments to network items that aren’t on your network? Those really make for painfully long response times in open-file dialogs on Windows. Especially in Office applications.
Also, you can try changing the file type to “All Files (.)” before browsing around your filespace; that may speed up things since you are no longer asking Word to discern image files from non-image files.
You’re not alone. Office Open and Save File dialogs generally incorporate a lot of suckage anyway. I have a growing suspicion that they assigned this part of the Windows API to the office slacker. :rolleyes:
Try storing all your images in a separate folder and then typing the path into the From File box. This is based on Word 97, and it assumes you know the name of the image you want to insert.
Create a folder just for pictures, like c:\pics.
Store all your images in c:\pics.
In Word, press ALT + I for the Insert menu.
Press P for Picture.
Press F for From File. All together, that’s ALT + I, P, F.
In the From File field, type c:\pics\image1.jpg and press enter.
The idea is to not give Word a chance to preview images. Keep two things in mind.
Unless you browse elsewhere, Word uses a default drive when inserting pictures, like the C: drive. If this is the case for you, keep your C: drive clear of images.
Once you browse to a folder, Word remembers it. The next time you go to insert an image, Word starts looking in the last folder you used. This is why you want to type the path of that pics folder and not browse to it.
Sorry if that’s too much techno mumbo jumbo. If you need anything explained more, let me know. You might also want to check the size of your images and see how much free disk space you have. Sometimes people can send you images that are freaking insanely large.
I fear that is part of the problem. We work in tifs around here to get really good resolution on the images, but it does generate monster files – unfortunately we do that to ourselves.
I like the suggestion of directing instead of browsing. That makes a lot of sense to me. I’ve used that trick in CAD applications that pulled thumbnails of blueprints up, just didn’t think to apply it here.
