The Problem:

Every time I type anything that looks like a web address or email address, Word creates a hyperlink for me. I can get rid of the hyperlink with Undo, but how do I stop Word from doing this?

The Solution:

In Word 2003 or Word XP, if you can see a Smart Tag under the start of the hyperlink, click the Smart Tag and choose Stop Automatically Creating Hyperlinks from the pop-up menu.

If there's no Smart Tag, choose Tools » AutoCorrect Options (in Word 2000, choose Tools » AutoCorrect), click the AutoFormat As You Type tab, and uncheck the "Internet and network paths with hyperlinks" box.

See Where a Hyperlink Will Really Take You

The Problem:

I've been sent a document with a hyperlink in it, but when I click the hyperlink, my browser displays a page with a different address than the one in the hyperlink.

The Solution:

You might find this annoying, but it's not a glitch. The anchor text for a hyperlinkthe text that appears in the document to indicate the presence of the hyperlinkdoesn't have to be related to the URL used in the hyperlink. Thus, you can create a hyperlink with descriptive text (for example, "Click here to display the brochure") rather than the address of the hyperlink.

Where this gets confusing is when, for example, someone pastes a URL or email address into a Word document. Word automatically creates the appropriate type of hyperlink (for example, an http:// hyperlink for a URL and a mailto: hyperlink for an email address) and displays the pasted text as the anchor text. If someone then accidentally (or intentionally) edits the anchor text, it will be different from the target URL or email address to which it is linked, but the link will still be correct, as long as it was correct in the first place.

If you need to edit the target address of a hyperlink, or you just want to see where it will take you, right-click it and choose Edit Hyperlink. (In Word 2000, right-click and choose Hyperlink » Edit Hyperlink.) From the Edit Hyperlink dialog box, you can edit the text of the hyperlink and the URL to which it links.