Excel 2004: Which prefs to trash?

[Norman R. Nager, Ph.D.]

In Office X, if Excel got corrupted, one could frequently solve the problems
by trashing Excel Settings (10), Microsoft Office Settings (10), and
Microsoft Component Preferences.

1. Which are the preferences to trash that could cause corruption in Excel,
please?

2. And does one have to trash all of them or is there a priority order in
which one can remove them in case only one or a couple preference files is
involved?

3. Couple problems I suspect are caused by corrupted preferences:

-- Although I have changed the General preference for new workbooks from 3
sheets to 1, it continues to open 3.

-- When I open a new workbook, or launch Excel, the new workbook will have
an artifact, such as a formula I had used in the first cell in a workbook
that I never saved after just using the one cell.

Any counsel you can give would be very much appreciated.

Respectfully, Norm

 

[JE McGimpsey]

1. Which are the preferences to trash that could cause corruption in Excel,
please?

I'd say, in the ~:Libraryreferences:Microsoft folder,

com.microsoft.Excel.prefs.plist
com.microsoft.Office.prefs.plist
Office Registration Cache 11
Excel Toolbars (11) (if it involves custom toolbars/menus)

2. And does one have to trash all of them or is there a priority order in
which one can remove them in case only one or a couple preference files is
involved?

Don't know about a priority - the order listed is what I'd use, but then
I just trash the whole folder, since I set all my preferences in code in
a startup add-in for both Word and Excel.

3. Couple problems I suspect are caused by corrupted preferences:

-- Although I have changed the General preference for new workbooks from 3
sheets to 1, it continues to open 3.

Do you have a file named Workbook in your HD:Applications:Microsoft
Office 2004:Office:Startup:Excel folder? If so, that template overrides
the internal template.

-- When I open a new workbook, or launch Excel, the new workbook will have
an artifact, such as a formula I had used in the first cell in a workbook
that I never saved after just using the one cell.

That would reinforce my suspicion that you have a "Workbook" file in
your startup folder, or your alternate startup folder location, if you
set it in Preferences/General.

 

[Paul Berkowitz]

I'd say, in the ~:Libraryreferences:Microsoft folder,

com.microsoft.Excel.prefs.plist
com.microsoft.Office.prefs.plist
Office Registration Cache 11
Excel Toolbars (11) (if it involves custom toolbars/menus)

I've noticed I also have an old-fashioned OS 7-style prefs file called
"Microsoft Excel" in the Microsoft folder. It was last modified Nov. 2004 so
it may have something to do with Excel 2004. I don't have any classic
version OMM now. It's also totally empty (opened in TextEdit). Does anyone
else have one of these?

--
Paul Berkowitz
MVP MacOffice
Entourage FAQ Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/faq/index.html>
AppleScripts for Entourage: <http://macscripter.net/scriptbuilders/>

Please "Reply To Newsgroup" to reply to this message. Emails will be
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PLEASE always state which version of Microsoft Office you are using -
**2004**, X or 2001. It's often impossible to answer your questions
otherwise.

 

[Norman R. Nager, Ph.D.]

I'd say, in the ~:Libraryreferences:Microsoft folder,

com.microsoft.Excel.prefs.plist
com.microsoft.Office.prefs.plist
Office Registration Cache 11
Excel Toolbars (11) (if it involves custom toolbars/menus)

Thanks! I've updated my Entourage Note on preferences to remove from the
list I had for Office X Excel preferences to the above. I wonder how I
ended up with one com.microsoft.Excel.prefs.plist file in the Microsoft
prefs subfolder and another one loose in the parent folder.

Don't know about a priority - the order listed is what I'd use, but then
I just trash the whole folder, since I set all my preferences in code in
a startup add-in for both Word and Excel.

Hmmm? How complicated is it to do that? Is there a url where I can look
for how-to info?

Do you have a file named Workbook in your HD:Applications:Microsoft
Office 2004:Office:Startup:Excel folder? If so, that template overrides
the internal template.

I did, indeed. It's now trashed.

That would reinforce my suspicion that you have a "Workbook" file in
your startup folder, or your alternate startup folder location, if you
set it in Preferences/General.

The artifact is gone. But the General preference for new workbooks is set
at opening 1 sheet and continues to open with 3 sheets (to the wind?).
That's a small problem, indeed. I guess if I want that one to go away,
I'll have to trash more than com.microsoft.Excel.prefs.plist files and set a
bunch of new preferences, unless you have another idea?

Thanks, again, J.E., for your thoughtfulness and help.

Respectfully, Norm

 

[Paul Berkowitz]

Thanks! I've updated my Entourage Note on preferences to remove from the
list I had for Office X Excel preferences to the above. I wonder how I
ended up with one com.microsoft.Excel.prefs.plist file in the Microsoft
prefs subfolder and another one loose in the parent folder.

They're not the same. The on in the Microsoft subfolder is called

com.microsoft.Excel.prefs.plist

The one in the outer Preferences folder is called

com.microsoft.Excel.plist

No ".prefs" in the latter. This one is mostly for telling the system dialogs
like Save As, Open and Print where the location it last opened to so it
should open there again, and where the default locations are.

--
Paul Berkowitz
MVP MacOffice
Entourage FAQ Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/faq/index.html>
AppleScripts for Entourage: <http://macscripter.net/scriptbuilders/>

Please "Reply To Newsgroup" to reply to this message. Emails will be
ignored.

PLEASE always state which version of Microsoft Office you are using -
**2004**, X or 2001. It's often impossible to answer your questions
otherwise.

 

[JE McGimpsey]

I've noticed I also have an old-fashioned OS 7-style prefs file called
"Microsoft Excel" in the Microsoft folder. It was last modified Nov. 2004 so
it may have something to do with Excel 2004. I don't have any classic
version OMM now. It's also totally empty (opened in TextEdit). Does anyone
else have one of these?

I don't have one for XL, but I do have one for Word.

Weird...

 

[Bernard Rey]

Paul Berkowitz wrote :

I've noticed I also have an old-fashioned OS 7-style prefs file called
"Microsoft Excel" in the Microsoft folder. It was last modified Nov. 2004 so
it may have something to do with Excel 2004. I don't have any classic
version OMM now. It's also totally empty (opened in TextEdit). Does anyone
else have one of these?

I have that one too. Apparently empty too, and couldn't find out how it has
been created. I just tried opening older versions of Excel up to 98 and
modified the Preferences, the modification date (10/30/04) didn't change...

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

I've noticed I also have an old-fashioned OS 7-style prefs file called

I don't have one for XL, but I do have one for Word.

Assuming OS 7-style is the same as OS 9-style:

I have one for Excel, Word, and Powerpoint, plus similar for VBA Prferences,
PDF Maker, OLE Registration Database 11, and Clip Gallery Preferneces. I
believe a while back I dragged one onto the desktop and it never got
recreated. I'd really like to know what they are. The ones I checked are
empty, save maybe Clip Gallery Prefs.

Daiya

 

[Paul Berkowitz]

Assuming OS 7-style is the same as OS 9-style:

I have one for Excel, Word, and Powerpoint, plus similar for VBA Prferences,
PDF Maker, OLE Registration Database 11, and Clip Gallery Preferneces. I
believe a while back I dragged one onto the desktop and it never got
recreated. I'd really like to know what they are. The ones I checked are
empty, save maybe Clip Gallery Prefs.

I've got most of those too (except PPT). My OLE Registration Database 11 is
definitely not empty - it's 392 KB - and is full of coded stuff and text.
But I use AppleScript (OLE Automation) a lot. Organization Chart Settings
(16 KN) has a few lines of stuff. But maybe there's invisible content too: I
just changed VB Editor prefs to require Variable declarations. The VBA
Preferences file showed a new modification date, I quit Word and opened that
file in TextEdit - and it's still empty. Strange.

So some of these are still being used and haven't been updated to an OS X
type of file or icon. But I really wonder whether those "Microsoft Excel",
etc. files really have anything,

--
Paul Berkowitz
MVP MacOffice
Entourage FAQ Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/faq/index.html>
AppleScripts for Entourage: <http://macscripter.net/scriptbuilders/>

Please "Reply To Newsgroup" to reply to this message. Emails will be
ignored.

PLEASE always state which version of Microsoft Office you are using -
**2004**, X or 2001. It's often impossible to answer your questions
otherwise.