Using the Document Inspector

  • Article

The Document Inspector gives users an easy way to examine documents for personal or sensitive information, text phrases, or other document contents. They can then use the Document Inspector to remove unwanted information; for example, before they distribute the document.

Note

Microsoft does not support the automatic removal of hidden information for signed or protected documents, or for documents that use Information Rights Management (IRM). We recommend that you run the Document Inspector before you sign a document or invoke IRM on a document.

As a developer, you can use the Document Inspector framework to extend the built-in modules and integrate your extensions into the standard user interface.

The Document Inspector in Microsoft Word 2010, Microsoft Excel 2010, and Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 include the following enhancements.

Built-in Document Inspector Modules

The Document Inspector has modules that help users to inspect and fix specific elements of a given document. The Document Inspector in the 2010 Microsoft Office System includes the following built-in modules:

For Excel documents:

  • Comments and Annotations

  • Document Properties and Personal Information

  • Headers and Footers

  • Hidden Rows and Columns

  • Hidden Worksheets

  • Invisible Content

For PowerPoint documents:

  • Comments and Annotations

  • Document Properties and Personal Information

  • Invisible On-Slide Content

  • Off-slide Content

  • Presentation Notes

For Word documents:

  • Comments and Annotations

  • Document Properties and Personal Information

  • Headers and Footers

  • Hidden Rows and Columns

  • Hidden Worksheets

  • Invisible Content

  • Comments and Annotations

  • Document Properties and Personal Information

  • Invisible On-Slide Content

  • Off-slide Content

  • Presentation Notes

  • Comments, Revisions, Versions, and Annotations

  • Document Properties and Personal Information. This includes metadata, Microsoft SharePoint properties, custom properties, and other content information.

  • Custom XML Data

  • Headers, Footers, and Watermarks

  • Invisible Content

  • Hidden Text

For PowerPoint documents:

  • Comments and Annotations

  • Document Properties and Personal Information

  • Invisible On-Slide Content

  • Off-slide Content

  • Presentation Notes

For Word documents:

  • Comments, Revisions, Versions, and Annotations

  • Document Properties and Personal Information. This includes metadata, Microsoft SharePoint properties, custom properties, and other content information.

  • Custom XML Data

  • Headers, Footers, and Watermarks

  • Invisible Content

  • Hidden Text

Opening the Document Inspector

To open the Document Inspector:

  1. Click the BackstageButton tab, and then click Info.

  2. Click Check for Issues.

  3. Click Inspect Document.

Use the Document Inspector dialog box to select the type or types of data to find in the document.

After the modules complete the inspection, the Document Inspector displays the results for each module in a dialog box. If a given module finds data, the dialog box includes a Remove All button that you can click to remove that data. If the module does not find data, the dialog box displays a message to that effect.

If you choose to remove the data for a given module, the dialog box displays descriptive text that indicates whether the operation was successful or not. If the Document Inspector encounters errors during the operation, the module is flagged, displays an error message, and the data for that module does not change.