Workgroup templates

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Guest

Hello,

How can I install a workgroup templates location so that it applies to all
user that log onto a computer. Is there a registry hack or something even
simpler?

Thank you,

Daniel
 
Daniel said:
Hello,

How can I install a workgroup templates location so that it applies
to all user that log onto a computer. Is there a registry hack or
something even simpler?

Thank you,

Daniel
Click to expand...

There is no single place to enter the location for all users. There is a way
to insert the location multiple times in the registry, but it's not really
less work than doing it through Word's Options dialog as the users log in
for the first time.

You need to go to the key HKEY_USERS. Determine which of the keys under that
(starting with S-1-5-...) correspond to the users who can log in -- they'll
be the ones that have a Software subkey, but there are others.

In each user's key, go to the subkey
Software\Microsoft\Office\<version>\Common\General
where <version> is the version of Office installed on the computer: 9.0 for
Office 2000, 10.0 for Office XP, or 11.0 for Office 2003.

Within that subkey, create an item named SharedTemplates. Technically that
item should be of type REG_EXPAND_SZ (which lets you use expandable
variables like %System32% to represent special folders), but RegEdit can't
create one of those so you can use Edit > New > String value instead (that
makes it of type REG_SZ).

Double-click the name of the new item and enter the complete path to the
workgroup location as its value. Don't use quotes around the path, even if
it contains spaces.

Now repeat that for each other user's key.
 
Jay,

First off, thank you for your previous post.... at least I know were to start.

Which brings me to my second question. Is this something that can be done
with batch file or vbs? Would you have an example that I could greatly
inspire myself from (yes copy)? Also,how can programmatically test to see if
the key already exists, if so edit it, if not create it? I have never messed
with reg editing through programming before.

Another idea, which might be easier (or maybe not... you tell me). can this
be done through VBA? Would it be simpler/possible to create a doc that would
have a macro that could get run on open and that would configure this
setting. I would then just have to get my users to open the doc and job
done?!

Just ideas! What do you think?!

Thank you once again for your help!!!

Daniel
 
Hi Daniel,

Yes, you can do this quite simply with VBA. Ideally, you should distribute
the macro in a template with a digital signature, but that's quite expensive
for a one-shot job. You can do it in a document and without the signature if
you have the users do more work.

Distribute a document containing this macro (see
http://www.gmayor.com/installing_macro.htm):

Sub AutoOpen()
Const WGPath = "\\myserver\myshare\templates"
Options.DefaultFilePath(wdWorkgroupTemplatesPath) _
= WGPath
End Sub

Of course, put in the real path to your shared templates location.

You'll have to instruct users that they must do this *before* they open the
document:

- Go to Tools > Macro > Security.
- Set the security level to Medium.

Now, they should open the document. Word will display a box with some scary
wording about macro viruses, but because they know that this one is from
you, they should click the Enable Macros button. In the instructions, and
again in the body of the document, tell them to go back to the Security
dialog and set the level to High. Remind them not to enable macros if they
don't know where they originated. Close the document.

This needs to be done only once for each user, unless the location later
changes.
 
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