read only documents - can it be used by multiple users

bonkers

I am trying to find a way around multiple people editing the same word document.. is there anyway of a number of users on teh same network editing one word document at the same time?

please please say there is

SouperComputer

Depends on the document. MS word, generally no unless your network is geared for it. Basically you are looking for somthing that has a database on the backend.

There is good news however, if the info isnt of major security importance, you can use googles online docs and spreadsheets

Capt'n Midnight

There is a concept in word of Master Document, which links to multiple other documents. So they could each edit a different part. Unfortunately it doesn't work reliably in versions 2000 and lower and I really could care if they got it working since. And overall word has a brain dead way of saving documents unless you turn OFF fast save.

IMHO I was using more recoverable document editors 20 years ago. Floppy drive ones always created backup and the file format was so simple you could recognise and delete junk caused by bad sectors in a text/hex editor. (the temp files word creates are very little use after a crash) And the mainframe one had a complete history of keystrokes and stored each revision of each file with a new number, so you could go back to ANY save or in the event of a crash, you could use the journal file to open the last save and roll forward to any point.

As you can guess I'm really annoyed at having to waste a lot of time on word foibles because new features seem more important than sorting out old problems /RANT