Excel 2004: properly saved workbooks slip up under toolbars?

[Norman R. Nager, Ph.D.]

Previously saved workbooks whose tops butted up to the bottom of the lowest
toolbar up to the past few weeks, now open out of position partially hidden
underneath the toolbars. I've been using Office 2004 since May 2004 and
the problem only started in Feb. 2005. But I do recall this happening
once long ago in Office X, so I can't blame it on OS 10.3.8.

WORKAROUNDS:

1. PREVIOUSLY SAVED WORKBOOK: Once I re-position such a workbook and save
it anew, from then on it will open butted up to the bottom of the lowest
toolbar.

2. CREATING NEW WORKBOOKS: I solved the problem of brand new "Workbook 1"
files opening partially hidden by the toolbars by re-positioning one and
saving it as a template named "Workbook" in the Applications/Microsoft
Office 2004/Office/Startup/Excel folder.

PRIORITY #1: PREVENTION

1. How can I prevent this "forgetting" of properly saved position under
toolbars from happening again to all previously saved workbooks?

2. Could a utility program that cleans caches have caused this to happen to
all saved workbooks as well as newly created ones?

3. Could DiskWarrior 3.0.2 or TechTool Pro 4.0.3 rebuilding of directory
structure be a likely causal agent?

PRIORITY 2: BETTER WORKAROUND

Aside from the workaround of re-positioning and then re-saving each of the
older Excel 2004 and Excel X files that I have not fixed in the past couple
weeks, is there a simpler way of making sure that all of them open as they
were positioned when last saved?

Thanks.

Respectfully, Norm

 

[J Laroche]

Norman R. Nager, Ph.D. wrote on 2005/02/19 15:39:

....

PRIORITY 2: BETTER WORKAROUND

Aside from the workaround of re-positioning and then re-saving each of the
older Excel 2004 and Excel X files that I have not fixed in the past couple
weeks, is there a simpler way of making sure that all of them open as they
were positioned when last saved?

It looks like all your toolbars are not properly anchored to the top of the
screen, under the menu bar.

JL
Mac OS X 10.3.8, Office v.X 10.1.6

 

[Domenic]

This happened to me not too long ago. I was able to correct the problem
by trashing Excel's preference files. If I'm not mistaken, I deleted
two files...

1) Home > Library > Preferences > Microsoft > Excel Toolbars (10)

2) Home > Library > Preferences > com.microsoft.Excel.plist

Try deleting only the first one to see if that will suffice. If not,
delete the second one too.

I doubt the utility program or DiskWarrior caused this problem. I have
neither program on my system (Office X, OS 10.2.8).

Hope this helps!

 

[Norman R. Nager, Ph.D.]

It looks like all your toolbars are not properly anchored to the top of the
screen, under the menu bar.

That certainly is important to rule out in diagnosing and fixing a possible
cause. But, in this case, when the problem started, I verified that all
were properly anchored. So, although that was not the causal factor here,
it's certainly good advice for anybody who's watching this thread. Thanks,
J.L. for sharing your thoughts.

 

[Norman R. Nager, Ph.D.]

Because the Excel preference files are now working perfectly with dozens of
re-saved files and newly created worksheets, I hesitate to trash any just
yet. Re-setting all the Excel and possibly some additional Office 2004
preferences from scratch has to be balance at using the two-step workaround
on files I have not already re-saved.

Incidentally, the number and names of Excel 2004 preferences have changed
since Office X. Here's the current lineup:
com.microsoft.Excel.plist
com.microsoft.Excel.prefs.plist
Excel Toolbars (11)

But, Domenic, if I had had the wisdom to trash some Excel 2004 preference
files and possibly some Office 2004 prefs right at the beginning of this
issue, I would have been spared the creation of a new worksheet template
and the re-positioning and then re-saving of a couple dozen previously saved
worksheets.

So, thank you very much for your thoughtful reply, Domenic.

Perhaps an MVP can contribute the benefit of his or her thinking on this
issue? I'm also still wondering whether a cache cleaner or other
maintenance might be among the causal factors. There are confirmed issues
with the cache cleaner version and its interaction with recent Panther
versions.

Respectfully, Norm

On 2/19/05 2:32 PM, in article

 

[JE McGimpsey]

Perhaps an MVP can contribute the benefit of his or her thinking on this
issue?

If it's not a problem with the toolbars being undocked, I suppose that
trashing the com.microsoft.Excel.plist preference is the best way to go
(other than using Window/Zoom Window and saving, perhaps).

You shouldn't have to trash com.microsoft.Excel.prefs.plist - there's no
positioning data in that file. Excel Toolbars (11) won't affect window
position, unless the toolbars were undocked (the Standard and Formatting
toolbar will be docked by default when the preference is recreated).

FWIW, I never have had this problem, because I've got a Workbook_Open
class event in my startup add-in that positions each workbook window I
open just below the toolbars, fully left, full width minus 200 pixels,
full height minus 30 pixels (to leave a bit of desktop visible), and
sets the zoom to 100%.

 

[Norman R. Nager, Ph.D.]

Thanks very much, J.E.