Troubleshooting Guide for Damaged WordPerfect Documents

As with any computer file, WordPerfect documents can become damaged. Some of the Symptoms of document damage are as follows:

• WordPerfect or the computer locks when scrolling past a certain place in the document. 
• Attempting to open a document results in a convert file format box which reports the document is in an "Unknown Format" or a format other than what it is expected.
• WordPerfect performs "strangely" when working on a specific document.
• The Document is blank when opened or gives a GPF (General Protection Fault) error message.
• Get an error "Error: Cannot copy < Filename >, the directory or file." while within WordPerfect or Windows Explorer.
   

The purpose of the following troubleshooting options is to try to salvage as much of the document as possible.

1. Pull the document from a backup disk/tape.
2. X-Retrieve:

From a blank WordPerfect screen type an X

insert the damaged document into the current document (Insert menu, File...)

Or select, copy and paste the corrupt document into the new blank document with an X typed.

   3.  Viewer:

If you have WordPerfect 6,7,8,9,10, for Windows, copy the contents from the Viewer. To do this:

Start from a blank document screen and choose File | Open, click View | Preview | No Preview, then click ONCE on the document in the left window.

Right click in the preview window, select content, left click with the mouse in preview window, hold and drag through document until highlighted,

Right click in the preview window and copy, click close for file open window.

In a blank document, click Edit | Paste and the document will be placed in the current screen. Save the file with new name.

    4.  Users may also experience some success using the WPLOOK program.

Refer to Article: 

Repairing WordPerfect® documents using WPLOOK

    5.  Using Quattro Pro:

Open Quattro Pro

Click file open, change file type to all files, select document, click open,

If the data shows up, use the mouse to select the range of cells containing the text.

Click edit, copy (or Ctrl C),

Close Quattro Pro,

Open WordPerfect, click Edit | Paste. Save file with new name, then reformat file.

In some cases where WPLook.exe and X-Insert will not recover the document, saving without metadata will recover it without loss of formatting.

Some common causes of document damage are:

• The computer locks and forces the user to reboot while working on a document.
• A power surge/outage occurs while working on a document.
• A Terminate-Stay-Resident (TSR) program causes a conflict in memory.
• The computer is turned off while the hard drive is running.
• The disk the file was saved on is damaged.
• A problem occurs on the computer which results in cross-linked files (running CHKDSK or SCANDISK will let you know if files are cross linked).

Note: This is not a comprehensive list!