Bill D -

Word, since about ver 6.0 at least, has a little device called the "spike," that allows you to clip multiple items "on the spike" and then paste them all or one at a time in various places in documents. I never used it much because I found it confusing that stuff came off the spike in reverse order - i.e. LIFO, or Last In First Out. Latest Windows Office applications (i.e. XP and 2K) will pop up a "clip board history" that allows you to pick any of the last few "copies" when you get ready to paste.

In Word, if you have anything in the clipboard, you should be able to just "paste" - or use the "Paste Special" (Alt-E,S) to paste in any of several formats. I use it a lot to paste web stuff as "unformatted text" in order to strip out all the junk. Curiously, in most Excel versions, if you use Ctl-C to copy, "paste special" is unavailable. You have to use the formal "Edit, Copy" to be able to choose what to paste (data, format, formulas, etc.).

Fergie's problem appears to be that nothing is getting into the clipboard. He has posted to a couple of other threads since his last entry here, so it's apparently not just PMS-F (progressive massive system failure). The last couple of suggestions are pretty much "long shots," but there's not much else to offer without knowing more about what programs are involved.

If you right click a link on a web page and select "Copy link," when you paste into Word you get the "plain text" URL (http:// etc). If you right click on a link and "Copy link" in something that's already pasted into Word, when you paste, you get a "duplicate clicky." You have to choose "Edit Link" and copy the URL from the "edit box" if you want the text of the URL. (Anyone got a simpler method?) I do find it convenient occasionally to paste something, with the clickies included, so that I can go through "off the web" and read/convert the clickies to URLs for record purposes. When you're done converting, you can convert links to plain text with Ctl-Shift-F9 - the "unlink fields" quick-key.

I did find a reminder of something I encountered some time ago. A few versions of Win95 (depending on updates) and other OS when connecting through some specific early NT servers, will copy all images as .bmp - regardless of the format on the source. You will rarely get a .bmp instead of what you expect if the image download "hangs" and isn't complete when you try to save it. Usually the solution is just to "refresh" and make sure that the image finishes loading. If you know that you have one of the "susceptible systems," you can usually work around it by finding a link to the image, right clicking, and selecting a "save target as," and get the "real" .jpg or .gif that's posted. You can often save images from sites that "disable copying" (e.g. the San Fransico Museum of Fine Arts - but don't tell them) using the same method.

John