Menu Customization Oddity

[Jose]

One of my programs has a Word template which, IIRC, adds a custom
menu. I have disabled that template, and I do not keep a normal.dot
template from one session to the next. Consequently, as expected,
there is nothing about that template or that program when I look at
Word's macros or templates or add-ins. However, not as expected, the
program's custom menu persists on my menu bar. I think that is the
cause of Word's always asking me if I want to save normal.dot's
changes. Why does that customization persist, and how can I get rid
of it??

 

[Jezebel]

What do you mean, you 'do not keep a normal.dot template from one session to
the next' ?
Unless you explicitly go and delete it each time, you *do* have a persistent
normal.dot. That's the way Word works. The prompt about saving normal.dot
refers to saving changes to it, not whether to save it at all.

And from your description, normal.dot is where your persistent menu is
stored. Right-click any toolbar or menu, select customize, drag the menu
into oblivion. And in this case, when prompted to save changes to
normal.dot, say yes.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Also, if by "disabled," you mean unloaded from Tools | Templates and
Add-ins, note that unless you have removed it from the Word or Office
Startup folder, it will still load every time you start Word, and when it
loads it will add its menu to the menu bar.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

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[Jose]

I've been trying for two days to reply to Jezebel, but Qwest
won't take my post, so perhaps I can answer your post, Suzanne, and
append my reply to Jezebel, too....

Also, if by "disabled," you mean unloaded from Tools | Templates
and Add-ins, note that unless you have removed it from the Word
or Office Startup folder, it will still load every time you
start Word, and when it loads it will add its menu to the menu
bar.

By 'disabled' I mean that I changed the extension, so that
the file's name went from filename.dot to filename.dot.disabled

What do you mean, you 'do not keep a normal.dot template from
one session to the next' ?
Unless you explicitly go and delete it each time, you *do* have
a persistent normal.dot. That's the way Word works.

Only if one has ever saved it and not deleted it. When I
started using Graham Mayor's approach to keeping customizations in
a separate template(s), I deleted my normal.dot. Since I have
never ok'd the save at the end, there is no normal.dot template to
be found on my HD. I have been presuming that Word just rebuilds
one each time I load the program, but see below.

And from your description, normal.dot is where your persistent
menu is stored. Right-click any toolbar or menu, select
customize, drag the menu into oblivion. And in this case, when
prompted to save changes to normal.dot, say yes.

I did that, and it worked. The custom menu was gone, and
its absence was saved in normal.dot, which was stored in my user
templates folder. Reload word, still no custom menu, which is
good. So I tried an experiment, which gets to the heart of my
confusion here: I deleted that newly created normal.dot. When I
reopen Word now, the custom menu reappears. But I cannot locate a
copy of normal.dot anywhere on my HD. So where could that file
be, or what other mechanism exists for the custom menu to be
remembered (but not appear in a saved normal.dot after removing it
through the custom dialog)?

 

[Jezebel]

Only if one has ever saved it and not deleted it. When I

started using Graham Mayor's approach to keeping customizations in
a separate template(s), I deleted my normal.dot. Since I have
never ok'd the save at the end, there is no normal.dot template to
be found on my HD. I have been presuming that Word just rebuilds
one each time I load the program, but see below.

I'd say the problem is that you're not looking in the right places. (Windows
Search does sometimes miss areas of the HD.) There is ALWAYS a copy of
normal.dot if Word is running.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Only if it has been customized and saved (in Word 2002 and above).

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.