How To Save Office 2007 Settings-Preferences?

[Dr Ken Brown-Gratchev]

Followed different groups/threads, where lamenting of loss of Office 2003
Save My Settings Wizard was voiced, & read many alternatives/workarounds.
My schtick is in the Preventative domain. I'm not now transferring/upgrading
either my OS or my Office 2007 Pro +. I simply want to save my
customized-personalized settings & preferences in case of disaster (to my PC
and/or global catastrophic events), so it would be so wonderfully easy to
re-install my programs & simply import my saved settings & preferences, after
the re-install. Is there something already inherently a part of my Vista
Ultimate or Office 2007 Pro + that I'm somehow overlooking or don't recognize
its use because of how its named? Got to be an elegant and lazy way to
accomplish this! Input highly welcomed!

 

[Lucy Thomson (aka aneasiertomorrow)]

Hi Dr Ken

Do you mean the files & settings transfer wizard in XP? If so, it has been
replaced by the Windows Easy Transfer available through start -> all programs
-> accessories -> system tools -> windows easy transfer (there's probably a
quicker way to it but I'm still getting my head around vista...). For more
details on this feature see here:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/features/details/easytransfer.mspx

Hope that helps

Lucy

 

[Dr Ken Brown-Gratchev]

THANKS Lucy! Right on the mark! The easier way, for me, after following the
path to the shortcut, was to right-click on it, and then have it pinned to
the Start Menu. Thanks again!

Note: For the informationally impaired + impatient, such as me, keep in
mind that on the info link in Lucy's reply, there is reference to and
download linkage for "Easy Transfer Companion Beta". This is ONLY useful
when your system is XP and your are going to a Vista system ... NOT if your
ALREADY HAVE & USE a Vista system. The first pathway she provided: " ...
start -> all programs -> accessories -> system tools -> windows easy transfer
... " . is for current Vista system users.

 

[Lucy Thomson (aka aneasiertomorrow)]

No problem at all - thanks for letting us know it was the solution you were
after

Good call about the download only being for XP users - Vista users should
already have it, but may not know they do.

Lucy

 

[AlexBY]

Hello let me add my 5 cents.

A Ken said it's very important to make from time to time dump of Offic
settings only! (I know need to grab all my windows profile for thi
purpose).

Let me describe my worries about settings.
I started using office "Save sett..." wizard somewhere in 2003.
I always try to get the most from software I use by adjusting it an
customizing. Regarding the office I actively use "shortcuts" navigatio
pane in Outlook, templates, forms and places in "open/save" dialog
(let's skip other minor things I need).
Every unexpected close of Outlook (even it seemed to me everything wa
fine while closing it) resulted to resetting all changes made i
"shortcuts" navigation pane to single item - "Add shortcut" - the onl
fast way to fix this I found that time - is just restore settings vi
wizard. (the other way is add again about 30 shortcuts in use at tha
moment). I started saving settings every half of the year (about 50% o
shortcuts were changed in that period).
Using wizard I migrated from Win2k to XP without any time loss.
Migration from XP to Windows 7 plus migration from Office 2003 to 200
took about 3 days!!!
I tried USMT - isn't supported by 64 bit Win 7!!!
It was horrible situation, finally I overcame it.

As for now, after 3 month of experience with Win7 + Office 2007 I go
my environment broken!
Yes, that's my fault - I had issues with installing one progra
packaged with MS Visual Studio 2008. It said the installation wa
terminated in previous run and please start it again - it said it al
the time, every run. I decided to clean up "%SystemRoot%\Installer
folder completely in order to erase installation related settings - tha
was *BIG mistake* as I found it out then.
Many programs and Office as well, persist there specific databases an
*icons* for *running programs* (installed somewhere in "C:\Program File
....")
As a result MS Office lost all icons for
- Programs (lost icons without possibility to fix it manually i
explorer)
- files (documents were recognized by Win, but their appearance i
explore were as files with unknown type to process)

After such barbarian clean up method regarding to MS Office, "Repair
add/remove" installation actions from "Control Panel"/"Programs" wer
impossible - installation started, asked for distributive (I pointed i
to distributive on network drive), started progressing and in the middl
of the process said "the installation was terminated due to errors"
nothing else (no logs for user, no reasons why, no suggestions).
I spent about 4 hours to get icon binaries, edit the registry and fi
the issue with icons.

I contacted our system administrators about the issue - complet
physical removal of MS Office and install it again is suggested a
single solution in my case.

As for the topic: Saving settings of Office 2007.
I want to save current my "office 2007 user settings" only (includin
mail rules/filters, shortcuts and the rest in Outlook, menu items on th
ribbons and etc.) and reinstall MS Office 2007
I believe most of the things still persisted in registry and Window
Easy Transfer will not grab these things and for me.
At the same time I see WET collects the files from profiles (sur
templates and signatures will be picked up) - I don't believe it know
about all office settings because they are different products.
So I don't think WET will help me - I'm not going to kill folders i
profile - the files will remain there. But *many my settings of Offic
will be lost*!

To my mind, each software should have specific supporting produc
(implemented by the same developers, because they know all setting
storages - where and how it's stored)

I see now, I had support from the Office team in version 2003.
But now I have to pay extra money for this support
http://www.settingsbackup.com/index.as