I am receiving an error message that my dissertation submission file is too large when submitting it to the School of Advanced Studies (SAS) website, requiring the size reduced so that I can upload it.

The submission may be over the 25 megabytes (MB) file size limit set on the SAS website and will need to be reduced. Generally, the culprit of this issue lies with the size of the images within the submission.

To reduce the size of the images within the submission, please perform the following:

Microsoft Office Word 2010

1. Open any Microsoft Word based submission documents (e.g. File types: .doc, .docx) that contain images
2. Click the File Menu
3. Click Save As
4. Click the Tools drop-down
5. Select Compress Pictures
6. Select the option next to Screen (150 ppi) or E-mail (96 ppi)
7. Click OK
8. Update your File Name to document the change in compression so that the original document and compression still exists if needed in the future
9. Check the box Delete cropped areas of pictures
10. Click Save

Microsoft Office Word 2013 & 2016

1. Open any Microsoft Word based submission documents (e.g. File types: .doc, .docx) that contain images
2. Click the File tab
3. Click Options
4. Click Advanced
5. Select Compress Pictures
6. Under Image Size and Quality, click the document that you want to set the default picture resolution for (if necessary)
7. In Set default target output to, click either Screen (150 ppi) or E-mail (96 ppi)
8. Click OK
9. Click Save

Note: If your submission files remain too large to upload, additional steps may be required to reduce your image size. Please perform the following steps.

Word 2010

1. Open any Microsoft Word based submission documents (e.g. File types: .doc, .docx) that contain images
2. Right Click on an image
3. Choose Size and Position from the drop-down menu
4. Click the Size tab if it is not selected automatically
5. Under the Scale section of the menu, make sure that Lock aspect ratio is checked
6. Change the Height to a number between 70 - 80% and once changed the Width will also update to match the entered value
7. Repeat with each image
8. Save your file with an altered name to document the changes

Note: The maximum file size limit now appears to be 30mb as stated on the SASWebsite

For additional information, please see the related article(s).