Copy and paste in XP: Why not?

June 5, 2006 6:48 AM

Help us get rid of this Copy/Paste problem we're having in Windows XP Pro // SP2!

Throughout the office, we are unable to consistently copy and paste in Windows XP Professional. It acts as though the Clipboard is full, but when looking at Clipbook Viewer, there's nothing there! Restarting sometimes takes care of this, but it's a temporary reprieve until the problem starts again.

I've got AVG installed and ran a complete scan with no results. I've also run AdAware and SpyBot in an effort to purge this problem, and there's no joy in Mudville. Googling turns up nothing resembling help, so I turn to you, the green and ask you kindly for any input you may have on this manner.

posted by beaucoupkevin to computers & internet (11 comments total)

What do you mean "it acts as though the Clipboard is full"?
posted by Khalad at 6:53 AM on June 5, 2006

On my little Office clipboard monitor at the bottom-right of my screen, I've got "24 of 24 - Clipboard Items Collected"
posted by beaucoupkevin at 6:54 AM on June 5, 2006

It looks like it's a limit to how many items can be copied to Office's clipboard.

From MSoft's Office/Windows XP "features" page (link):
"Office clipboard task pane—Copy up to 24 pieces of information at once across all Office XP applications, and paste them in any order. The clipboard task pane shows a sample of what's on the clipboard to help you distinguish which items you want to paste into other documents."

Here is how to clear the Office clipboard.
posted by killjoy75 at 7:10 AM on June 5, 2006

My boss was just unable to copy and paste . We went to view the Office clipboard in Word (Edit> Office Clipboard,) which was empty and now he can copy and paste. One moment, no! Next minute, yes!

This is, as you imagine, causing much wailing and gnashing here.
posted by beaucoupkevin at 7:15 AM on June 5, 2006

(I emptied my clipboard and am able to copy and paste just fine and dandy at the moment.)
posted by beaucoupkevin at 7:16 AM on June 5, 2006

I've encountered this problem with 2 different products (which, unfortunately, I use often):

Firefox (a well known bug, apparently)

Remote Desktop Connection

In the second case, the lack of clipboard communication is easily solved by unceremoniously disconnecting, and then reconnecting immediately (to preserve your session).
posted by thanotopsis at 7:35 AM on June 5, 2006

I freely admit to being confused. Do you want to use the standard Windows XP cut, copy, and paste single-item clipboard, or do you want/need to use the multi-item whizbang Office clipboard? If you turn off the Office clipboard -- which can conflict with standard Windows clipboard operations as several people have posted in woeful stories similar to your own -- then the standard Windows clipboard should work.

Should being the operative word...
posted by mdevore at 9:00 AM on June 5, 2006

1) It happens in and out of Office, even with the Office Clipboard disabled.

2) It seemed to happen suddenly in the office. One day, we were all copying and pasting away and then the next, GRRRRNNKKK.

Just now, I was attempting to copy a URL from an email in Outlook into my IE address bar as well as Firefox and it wouldn't go in either. Typed "Hello World" into a Notepad document and was able to paste that into wherever I wanted.

It's seemingly random and frighteningly frustrating.
posted by beaucoupkevin at 10:57 AM on June 5, 2006

Just curious -- Do you use the menus, or the keyboard shortcuts (Ctrl-C for copy, Ctrl-X for Cut, Ctrl-V for paste)?
posted by vanoakenfold at 1:39 PM on June 5, 2006

Keyboard shortcuts, in general. It's the same when using the menus, though.
posted by beaucoupkevin at 1:51 PM on June 5, 2006

I've been having problems with Firefox refusing to let me copy things. Selecting text in FF and hitting Control-C, nothing is moved to the clipboard. Go to any other app and select/Control-C, clipboard is updated.

This comes and goes. Something to check, is Firefox always running on each machine when the failure occurs?
posted by Dunwitty at 2:01 AM on June 6, 2006