Those dots, which represent spaces, are an example of Word's nonprinting characters. Viewing them can help you work on a document, but they can also be annoying.
Fortunately, they're easy to turn off. In Word 6 or 7, select Tools--Options, then click the View tab in the Options dialogue box. In the Nonprinting Characters frame, click the Spaces check box to deselect it and turn off display of those pesky dots.
You can select or deselect other items in this frame as well -- Tab Characters, Paragraph Marks, Optional Hyphens and Hidden Text. I often work with the Paragraph Marks showing, since that makes formatting easier. When you're finished, click OK to make your changes the new defaults.
- George Campbell