# MS Word question

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-word-question/783301>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [March 29, 2017, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-word-question/783301 "2017-03-29T17:44:17Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![velomont](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/8491ac/32.png) [@velomont](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/velomont)\
**Post date:** [March 29, 2017, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-word-question/783301/1 "2017-03-29T17:44:17Z")

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We have MS Office 2013 and MS Word 2016. Whenever I mouse-click in a word in a table, the text-select marker (I don’t mean the mouse pointer or cursor btw. I mean the vertical line that normally is visible between characters (or wherever) and remains there regardless of where the mouse moves) becomes completely invisible, leaving me using a combination of shift-arrow keys in order to grey-out a couple of characters.

Strangely though, if I position the mouse over the ribbons/task bars, and scroll-bars, the marker appears and is clearly visible and flashing.

Is anyone familiar with this and is there a way of making this thing permanently visible?  
Thanks

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**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\
**Post date:** [March 29, 2017, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-word-question/783301/2 "2017-03-29T17:50:38Z")

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This tends to be a function of the specific video card and driver, in my experience. You might try updating the video driver if it’s not completely current.

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**Author:** ![voltaire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voltaire/32/313_2.png) [@voltaire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/voltaire)\
**Post date:** [March 29, 2017, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-word-question/783301/3 "2017-03-29T18:06:16Z")

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Yeah, and sounds like just the kind of thing that came with, and will probably disappear in, some stealth Win10 upgrade.

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**Author:** ![Knowed\_Out](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/knowed_out/32/7380_2.png) [@Knowed\_Out](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knowed_Out)\
**Post date:** [March 29, 2017, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-word-question/783301/4 "2017-03-29T19:25:17Z")

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I’ve seen this happen in earlier versions of MS Word too. The marker is there, just not visible.

Word isn’t too good with tables. Sometimes just moving a cell division line causes Word to crash. I have a better experience making the table in Excel and then copying it over.

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**Author:** ![OldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/3bc359/32.png) [@OldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldGuy)\
**Post date:** [March 30, 2017, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ms-word-question/783301/5 "2017-03-30T00:30:05Z")

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> [@Knowed\_Out](#):
>
> I I have a better experience making the table in Excel and then copying it over.

This very definitely