<HTML><HTML>On Fri, Jun 03, 2005 at 03:20:17AM -0400, nocturn wrote: > All I know is that up to 6.0, word used a very silly way to protect files. > > Try viewing them with strings, maybe the password is readable. Forgive me if I'm missing something I'm pretty ignorant, but: Long ago in Computer Shopper (in the UK) the tech help man published a word macro, saying that he was reluctant to, but he wouldn't be teaching the bad guys anything they didn't know, so he would help the reader. It was just a matter of using Word's inbuilt VBA? or whatever macro language it was to try every possible character combination. I cut out and saved the article - most unfortunately I had a look a couple of months ago and couldn't find it. I also tried Google but failed to find anything. So is Stephen motivated enough to put say Win 98 and Word 6 or 7 on an old box? (Or Wine?) The Shopper expert was good on exactly what range of characters to try for, but Stephen may be able to recall what he did and did not use in his passwords. Likewise Stephen may not have used the full number of characters which could greatly cut the time needed to run the macro. HTH, Edward</HTML>