"We do not accept articles that contain macros."

[thinker23]

What does this mean?? I don't know what macros are, so I can't remove them from the article just yet!

Please help!

[Gail Kavanagh]

Thinker, I have no idea what they are either, so I looked it up. This may help you:

http://www.homeandlearn.co.uk/mw/s10p1.html

[thinker23]

Thanks, I already read that too, but I still don't know what it means- my article follows all the guidelines it states :-/ Can ANYONE help please???

[aprilk10]

Found these definitions from Wikipedia:

Macro (computer science), a set of instructions that is represented in an abbreviated format
Macro instruction a statement, typically for an assembler, that invokes a macro definition to generate a sequence of instructions or other outputs.


Does your article contain any abbreviations or acronyms? If you used an acronym for sometning, I am guessing maybe you need to use the full text first. For example, if you refer to the IRS, maybe you need to write it: Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and then refer to it as IRS after that. Don't know...just guessing.

[thinker23]

I have only used abbreviations after first giving the full name.. But I'll try taking out all abbreviations now, and see if that works..

[aprilk10]

Type in "macro" in the search box here in the forums. There are a couple off others who have had similar situations. I tried to copy one thread here, but didn't work. I don't know how to link back to a previous thread! Anyway, looks like they are similar to hidden hyperlinks in a text.

[Celeste Stewart]

Macros are little programs that you can use in Word, Excel and other programs. For instance, in Word 2007, the Developer tab (if you opt to view it) contains a section where you can either run built-in macros or create your own. Macros are useful for running redundant tasks. Unfortunately, because macros are little mini-programs, they've been exploited by malware developers. Since there's a risk that a Word document containing a macro actually contains a virus, many organizations won't accept the document and its risk.

In Word 2007, you can disable macros by going to the Developer tab, clicking Macro security, and selecting "Disable all macros with notification." If you don't have the Developer tab visible, go to the Office button, click on Word Options, click Trust Center, click Trust Center Settings, and then choose the same "Disable" option.

[thinker23]

THANK YOU! Annoyingly though, the article request has now expired. Oh well..

[Lysis]

Just as a suggestion for the future -- CC lets you post in text (TXT file format). If you convert your file to TXT, macros won't carry over. Do "File" then "Save As," then select "text" in the drop-down "File type" box. You'll lost any kind of bold formatting, but it'll remove all macros.

[jadedragon]

Submit the article anyway. Likely will still sell.

[thinker23]

Thanks everyone.. I did try to resubmit again, but got told that there are still macros! But I've definitely disabled them.. So I'll try submitting as a text file now..

[Sharion]

When I first started all of mine were getting rejected for gibberish characters. Apparently my word processor was using curly quotes, which became gibberish on the editor's machine. Even when I tried to turn off curly quotes, the problem persisted.

I now export to TXT text files, open the TXT file in a different program that straightens curly quotes and then save it, and then turn it into an RTF so that I can bold section headers if relevant. What the Ed's here get is the RTF and that has worked like a charm. A bit of a run through regarding steps but once I got the flow of it, not really a big deal.

I have a new word processor which would probably work without a hitch. But I keep the curly quotes on because they are needed for something else I do So for here, I still go through the steps.

[thinker23]

I resubmitted as a .txt file, and have now been rejected with this error:

"can ëcrackí" --- There are many odd symbols like this throughout the article.

..But I can't see any such symbols in my document.. Can this be similar to 'curly' text? What should I do to remedy it?

[Sharion]

My curly quotes problem looked fine on my computer so you may not even see what the editor sees. HTML often shows off a problem such as this so I pasted the text into an HTML editor and then viewed it as a web page and voila, I could see the problem clearly. That allowed me to experiment, and paste it into the HTML editor to test it until I figured out how to clean it up.

I have a Macintosh and fixed it with a program called TextWrangler, choosing Straighten Quotes from the menus. Look for options in whatever word processing program you have relating to quotes.