X5 CWYW Causing Word 2010 to Freeze

EndNote EndNote General
21

Hello,

Same problem here. Windows XP, Office 2010, Endnot 5.0.1 Bld 5774. Using the

Start/Stop Endnote section does not help. I can reproduce the issue by

a) Copying references from one document to another (works mostly, but sporadically freezes word)

b) Include a reference within a figure caption, while the figure and its caption are kept in a frame. This normally works well. However everytime I move the frame to a different page (either dragging or copy paste) I trigger the freeze. If I delete the reference, then move the frame and then include the reference again all works fine.

Hope this helps to find the root of the problem

Ciao

22

I don’t have this problem on my home computer using the same word files but running Word 2007 and Endnote 5.01.

For me this problem seems isolated to Word 2010, though the computer running Word 2007 is much more powerful: _ i5 2500K @ 4.5Ghz, SSD, Win 7 x64 _ vs _ E8400 @ 3 Ghz, Win XP SP3, slowest 5400 rpm HDD in creation._

23

I continue to have this problem and it’s driving me nuts. I’m able to temporarily get around it by the instructions I posted above but it is completely unacceptable for this problem to be ignored. It is definitely a bug.

24

Same problem. Win 7 – Word 2010  –  EndNote X5.01  Routinely freezes when attempting to do routine bibliographic tasks.

25

@crazygecko wrote:

@ziko wrote:

 

 I am working to finish my Thesis now, which is in separate documents. I’ve just tried to insert all of them in one master document. Well, I don’t recommend it. In my case, this is a 100% crash every time.

 

 

To clarify your process and the crash occurrence, were the citations already formatted in each document before combining them into the master doc?  Or did you unformat the citations for each separate document first; merged the documents into one; then formatted the citations in the master doc?

 

If you did the former and experienced a crash, have you tried the latter?

 

Hi CrazyGrecko

Thanks for your answer.

I asked Technical Team for an advice and they told me to unformat citations and then copy block of texts into a new document. I have to admit the problem eventually disappeared. Now, I practically work on unformatted citations and turn them on only if I need to check citations in their final form or just before exporting / printing. I have also unticked two options regarding turning on auomatic format citations for all new documents. It is just safer and easier.

However, it is IMHO still sort of bug that has to be fixed, because EndNote crashes even though when two documents are linked to the same EndNote database. Somtimes when I forget and copy / paste a small block that contains fotmatted citation, EndNote also ocassionally crashes. At least workaround has been found and now I am not so much stressed as before :slight_smile:

Regards

26

@ziko wrote:

 

@crazygecko wrote:

@ziko wrote:

 

 I am working to finish my Thesis now, which is in separate documents. I’ve just tried to insert all of them in one master document. Well, I don’t recommend it. In my case, this is a 100% crash every time.

 

 

To clarify your process and the crash occurrence, were the citations already formatted in each document before combining them into the master doc?  Or did you unformat the citations for each separate document first; merged the documents into one; then formatted the citations in the master doc?

 

If you did the former and experienced a crash, have you tried the latter?

 

Hi CrazyGrecko

 

Thanks for your answer.

 

I asked Technical Team for an advice and they told me to unformat citations and then copy block of texts into a new document. I have to admit the problem eventually disappeared. Now, I practically work on unformatted citations and turn them on only if I need to check citations in their final form or just before exporting / printing. I have also unticked two options regarding turning on auomatic format citations for all new documents. It is just safer and easier…

 

Sorry that you have to “hobble” X5 by limiting use of CWYW but at least you’ve found a workaround.  I see you posted a response in sk0412 but didn’t note if you applied the “clean-up” hidden field codes instructions sk0412 noted in the posting…or did tech support provide the info for checking whether your document has hidden field codes that should be removed?

27

Hi CrazyGrecko,

I did not provide any information on hidden field codes because I think it was not a problem. I don’t know to be honest. Also, I don’t recon technical support actually suggested cleaning up the document from hidden field codes but I need to come back to the mail from them. I don’t even know what the hidden field codes are, to be honst :). I did not come across this term yet.

28

Below is a copy of the letter I have received from Technical Support. I am sure it will be useful for everybody here.

Regards

------------------------------ Beginning of the letter

Thank you for your email with the detailed information.

First, it is not recommended to cut or copy and paste formatted references in the document directly as this may damage the field codes.

When you insert a reference into a document it first inserts a plain text temporary citation that looks like this {Steve, 2010 #21}. If you have instant formatting turned on, as soon as you insert this reference, Word then uses Microsoft’s Field Code standard to create the code necessary for EndNote to dynamically work with the document. This code is hidden in the background of the document, behind the formatted reference you see. Cutting, coping and pasting, deleting or editing formatted citations and footnotes directly in the document will often result in orphaned pieces of the code which causes issues.

As copying/ cutting and pasting EndNote citations will cause damage to the field codes, it is always recommended to convert the document to unformatted citations and then proceed with copying/ cutting and pasting.

Steps below will assist you with merging chapters into one document in Word with a standalone bibliography and formatted citations:

Note: We strongly recommend saving a back up copy of all your Word files before following these steps

  1. First, create a blank document for all the chapters to be placed in.

  2. Open the first document to be merged and in Word go to the EndNote tab > "Convert Citations

and Bibliography > Convert to Unformatted Citations" command.

  1. Press [Ctrl]+A on the keyboard to highlight everything, press [Ctrl]+C to copy the highlighted text and then in the blank document [Ctrl]+V to paste.

Note: Please follow the step 2 and 3 for all chapters.

  1. Once you have pasted all the text into the blank document make sure you have all the libraries that contain the references open in EndNote and then in Word go to the EndNote tab > click on Update Citations and Bibliography.

This procedure should create a word file with one bibliography at the end.

If you want chapter bibliographies in addition to the master bibliography, you will need to do the following. This is the only option I can think of with the current functionality.

  1. With the original copy of your chapter documents (the ones with field codes), click Unformat

Citation(s) from the EndNote toolbar.

This will revert the citations to their temporary format and remove the bibliography.

  1. Merge all the unformatted document chapters into a master document.

  2. In the master document, click on Format Bibliography from the EndNote toolbar.

  3. When this is done, make a backup of this master document using the Save As option from the File menu.

  4. Click on “Remove Field Codes” from the EndNote toolbar to make this copy of the master document plain text.

  5. You can now copy the chapter bibliographies into this new master document from the copy of your chapter documents with the field codes removed.

Please refer the following knowldge base artcile for more information on chapter bibliographies:

http://help.thomson.com/default.asp?portalid=tsc&refid=TS_ENCWYWFAQ47

I hope this information helps! If the issue continues, please let us know.

------------------------------ End of the letter

29

The above “solution” is absolutely unacceptable. The one I posted earlier is much easier as a workaround this BUG that Thomson Reuters is apparently refusing to fix. I’ve just wasted more time dealing with this situation again. Has anyone tried another citation manager that not only works but was also designed by a company that fixes BUGS in a timely manner?

30

Hi,

The solution above works. I know it is not ideal one but it saved my time. I provided it here because I know most people have similar problem. You did not provide link to your the one you mentioned. Would you like to do so, please?

Regarding another software, the comparison of them is provided here. I used to use Mendeley and Zetero. They are good. I still have Mendeley because you can make your online database. It is great if you have constant access to papers (for instance student or researcher in any university). Therefore, the disadvantage is that you lose access to your papers once you are no longer entitled to read papers in popular databases because ionline Mendeley keeps only links or DOIs numbers.

I also test LaTeX and BibTeX but there is nothing better than EndNote to quickly build your database important details from online databases. There is also citation style that converts EndNote database into BibTeX.

I hope it’ll help.

31

I have a little different, less severe, yet irritating problem. 

I run Endnote X5 and Word 2007

When I use CWYW by pressing Alt-2, Word starts to add reference and then sort of freezes at Assigning hyperlink status and Endnote gets Server not responding. I have to click switch or retry to finish assigning hyperlinks. It doesn’t matter which one I click. I have about 150 reference in my word document. Is that why it is getting this message? Because it is too much maybe? If I click then the problem is solved, but I don’t like to click the server not responding everytime I add reference. This doesn’t happen to other documents with less references. 

Thanks for the help in advance!

32

Try following the steps found in this article:

http://help.thomson.com/default.asp?portalid=TSC&article=121320

Jason Berman
Technical Sup Rep RS

Thomson Reuters

Phone: +1 800-336-4474
thomsonreuters.com

33

The steps you provided are unaccetable. Why won’t Thomson FIX THE BUGS IN THEIR PROGRAM? I just received a notice yesterday about the annual upgrade to a new version - EndNote X6. Will that fix this bug? Also, how many new bugs are in it that Thomson will ignore until next year when EndNote X7 is offered for sale?

34

We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. The steps indicated turn off the hyperlink between in-text citations and the reference list. Doing this improves performance issues that some EndNote X5 users have reported with certain documents in Word 2010. These issues have been investigated by the Development Team. When EndNote X6 is released, you can certainly see if the free 30 day Demo improves performance for you.

Jason Berman
Technical Sup Rep RS

Thomson Reuters

Phone: +1 800-336-4474
thomsonreuters.com

35

Thank you for your reply.  Has the development team specifically addressed the issue in the X6 project? 

For software that is designed to work with Word 2010, it hardly seems fair to the user to try sell them a new expensive program if the frustrating bugs in previous versions have not been addressed.  I certainly empathize with jlamarca on this issue!

Is there a way to get an answer out of the developers at this point?  Has a patch been considered for X5?  After all, having only the one option of disabling a major feature of the software would be as good an excuse as any to distribute one.  What is the best contact number for additional information along the lines of this post?

Thanks again for offering suggestions.

36

This has been more than just an “inconvenience” I have literally wasted countless hours dealing with this bug (and it is a bug).

I am on the phone with EndNote tech support right now trying to confirm if this bug has been fixed in X6. (It should have been addressed and fixed long ago in X5 and one shouldn’t have purchase an upgrade just to get the program to function as intended). At the moment, the person on the phone cannot tell me if this problem has been addressed in X6. I’m not inclined to spend more money for a new buggy program if EndNote tech support can’t tell me the bug was fixed in X6. Furthermore, the refusal of Thompson Reuters to fix the problem in X5 doesn’t say much for their product. 

I have just been told by tech support that they’re going to have to look into this issue to see if it was addressed . . .

37

Hello - We are actively looking into this issue. Please note that this thread now has a mix of issues co-mingled so for clarification, we are looking into the copy/paste workflow that causes a crash/freeze. I ask that  people who have posted here contact me (send me a private message) so we can work with you directly. We haven’t been able to reproduce this consistently in-house so any additional details you can offer is extremely helpful.

 - Mathilda, the EndNote team

38

For those with the Copy Paste issue, we have a temporary workaround to offer until the issue is addressed. Within the Instant Formatting Settings, turn off the “Check for Citation Updates” option. This will enable you to leave Instant Formatting on but will require you to conduct a final Citation Update before distributing the document to make sure order changes, removals, etc… are updated.

  - Mathilda, the EndNote team

39

Thanks for the update Mathilda. I’ll mention it to my user and hopefully it will help him. He’s worked around the issue in part by not using formatted citations as he had previously done, but maybe he’ll be a little happier with this.

40

I have the same or very similar problem. Using an Intel Core i5, 1.60 Ghz, 4 GB RAM, 64-bit Windows 7 Home Premium, EndNote x5.0.1 (build 5774), and with Word 2010.

As I understand it, then, there may be various solutions to the “server busy” and Word freezing problem, which to me seem to be related (with EndNote bugs), the main solutions seem to include: working with unformatted citations, as well as an unchecked link-in citations, and the less checked/active options used in EndNote the better?

In other words, check and activate options in EndNote only until absolutely necessary?

However, when that time comes and Word freezes again when we are finalizing papers… what are we to do then?

If the development/technical team is unable to “consistently” reproduce the problem… given the frequency and volume of the issue’s occurrence… then the prospects of a “stable” solution truly doesn’t look promising.

Please know that I just recently purchased an upgrade to x5 and that, as I am sure others will concur, we truly hope that this critical issue be resolved promptly and, or, TR should start considering refunding those of us who purchased this faulty product for which a reasonably satisfying solution is not being provided.