Is there a way to control the size of tollbar buttons in Office?

[LouisF]

Hi,
Since I upgraded to OSX Tiger 10.4.7/Office 2004 (straight from OS
9.2.2/Office 98!), the toolbars in MS Word are enormous on screen, in
my OSX environment (though the toolbars in my old Word 98, under
Classic, are still just fine).

A friend found a posting somewhere saying, if we understood well, that
the "Customize toolbars/menus" dialog box should have an "Options" tab
where I might be able to control the size of the buttons in the
toolbars. I don't seem to have such a tab in this dialog. Am I looking
at the right place?

The toolbar buttons are just as big in Excel (2004) so this may be a
more general setting; is there a central preferences panel for all
Office, where such a control might be located?

Any other ideas?

 

[CyberTaz]

You correctly understood the information, but it evidently wasn't made clear
that it only pertained to the PC version of Office. Mac Office doesn't have
the Options page in the Customize dialog nor is the feature included
elsewhere in the Preferences, etc.

Take heart, though. Even if it were the default setting would probably be
for the *smaller* size with Large Icons being the option, so in your case
the feature won't be missed.

If you can you might want to increase your screen resolution thru System
Preferenceswhich may render the icon size closer to what you prefer.

 

[Jim Gordon]

Hi Louis,

There used to be a setting to turn on large toolbars in Mac Office. In
Excel 2001, for example, you would use Tools > Customize then click on
the Appearance tab. There's a checkbox for "Large Buttons."

In Office 2004 there is no corresponding checkbox or setting. It is not
possible to turn on large buttons because the program no longer has the
ability to display them.

Even if you try to use visual basic to change the size, it won't work.
This code will make the buttons large in 2001 but is ignored by 2004:

Sub MakeLargeButtons()
Set allBars = CommandBars
allBars.LargeButtons = False
End Sub

I say this because it is pretty safe to assume that if the toolbars in
Office 2004 are extremely large, it is almost certainly being caused by
something other than office.

Have you installed any "haxies"? These are programs that can enhance the
Mac OS user interface. Perhaps you got into MacOS settings under System
Preferences > Universal Access and changed something there.

Look for a cause outside of Office, because I don't think the button
size is even able to be changed no matter what you do within Office.

-Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

 

[LouisF]

Thanks, Jim.

I'm not sure what "haxies" are but I know I didn't install anything
that would cause this, at least not voluntarily. I just upgraded to OSX
from OS 9.2.2 and so far, all I installed is the OS itself, Office
2004, a French spelling / grammar SW called "Antidote" (plugs-in into
MW Word and other word processors; no reason to suspect it of messing
up with icon size; besides, I saw the big icons in Office before I
installed Antidote), and some SW from my ISP (Earthlink-DSL; the
package includes anti-virus, firewall, pop-up blocker; that kind of
stuff, so again no reason a priori to suspect this to be the culprit).

I did see the Universal Access control panel when I first toured my new
OS but did not turn on anything (just checked again). Besides, this
woud have enlarged everything on screen, not just the icons on the
toolbar, so I'm pretty sure this is not the problem.

Thanks for the effort with the VB script, even if you know that it
would actually be ignored by Office 2004, but anyway, what I want is to
get my icons smaller (like they were, and indeed still are) on my old
Word 98, under Classic, not larger.

Any other ideas?

 

[CyberTaz]

Another thought - you don't mention anything about the system, itself, & the
older OS/Office versions suggests that it may also be a somewhat older Mac.
Are you running at a resolution of 1024x768 or better? If not Office 2004
will not display a number of things correctly. It requires that as a
minimum.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[LouisF]

Thanks, Bob.

I have, indeed, ordered a larger screen, but that is not an adequate
solution. First, it costs me money when I was happy enough working with
my Word 98 on my old 17" CRT screen. Second, I suspect that the type
will be too small to read comfortably when I set my screen resolution
to where the Office icons are the way I want them and I will probably
have to work at 125 or 150% magnification in every application I use. I
will enjoy my new 19" TFT, of course, but that's just not right.

Still, I'm puzzled: if this is really just the way Office now shows its
toolbars (as opposed to some setting I might have triggered
accidentally), why did MS change this at all?

Or did they? I'm surprised that I did not see other postings about
this, which really makes me think that there must be a control
somewhere that causes it.

Any other ideas?

Louis

 

[LouisF]

Yes, my 17" CRT screen is set at 1024 x 768. I am running this on a G4,
400 MHz (AGP Graphics). (I know, I know, that's pretty pathetic, but it
does everything I need it to do, and I didn't have this "iconic"
problem until now...) I have played with the resolution at 1280 x 1024
and found myself in the situation I was describing: Toolbard are fine
but I have to view every document at 150% to be able to read 12-point
type. Of course, that same resolution will show larger on my 19" TFT,
when I receive it...

Louis

 

[Jim Gordon]

Hi Louis,

By any chance are you able to look at a different computer that's
running Office 2004 to compare what you see to another machine? The
2004 buttons don't seem larger to me, but maybe I'm just not that observant.

-Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

 

[LouisF]

Thanks for still trying, Jim. I asked a few Mac users I know (dad, bro,
in Canada...) if they observed something like that when they upgraded
to OSX (especially if they upgraded their Office suite at the same
time). Unfortunately, I am otherwise completely surrounded by Windows
(and Linux) users and there are not many Macs around...

But I'll keep asking. Given the paucity of responses to my question
(and of similar questions in the archive), however, this does not seen
to be a very common problem...

I'll get back to you when I get news from others. Thanks and cheers!

Louis

 

[Barry Wainwright [MVP]]

Can you please confirm which of the buttons you find to be too big - is it
the six 'navigation' button (Mail, Contacts, Calendar, Notes etc), or is it
the remaining row of buttons (New, Reply, Forward etc)?

The first six buttons can be changed from their default 'Huge' size, in the
'General' pane of Entourage's preferences, check the box for 'Display small
navigation buttons...'.

The remaining row of already small buttons cannot be customised yet

--
Barry Wainwright
Microsoft MVP (see http://mvp.support.microsoft.com for details)
Check out the Entourage User's WebLog for hints, tips and troubleshooting
<http://homepage.mac.com/barryw/weblog/weblog.html>

 

[LouisF]

Thanks, Barry. Actually, I'm concerned mostly about Word (I don't use
Entourage), and the buttons I find too big are all the buttons in all
the toolbars (they are all the same size, except those that are
dropdown menus, but these are still the same height: I'd say a good 50%
bigger than they used to be).

To make my two nice long toolbars that used to fit my screen width fit
my new Word 2004/OS X environment, I now have to make them over two
rows each. Adding just one more temporary toolbar for whatever I may be
doing (e.g. Reviewing, Table, Drawing; I use these toolbars quite a bit
too), and these 5 toolbar height-worth of buttons literally take about
a third of the height of my screen (17" CRT set at 1024x768). That's
way too much and, as I said in a previous posting, completely
unnecessary: two long rows of toolbars still fit nicely in the top 10%
or so of the same screen in my Office 98 (now running under the Classic
environment, but it looks exactly the sme as it used to in my native OS
9).

So, I'm puzzled.

Louis

 

[Bob Greenblatt]

Why don't you try trashing some of the prefs files. I assume that the
toolbars in other office applications like Excel and Powerpoint are OK,
correct? Start with ~library\preferences\microsoft\Microsoft Office
settings, and com.microsoft.word.prefs in the same folder. Of course quit
word and all other word apps before doing this.

 

[LouisF]

Actually, no, the toolbard in all office apps are this large size in
Office 2004; they all were (and still are, under Classic) the nice
smaller size in Office 98.

 

[LouisF]

Oh, I forgot to ask: what is the danger in trashing Pref file? I
customized my toolbard a great deal and I don't want to lose that...

Louis

 

[PhilD]

Oh, I forgot to ask: what is the danger in trashing Pref file? I
customized my toolbard a great deal and I don't want to lose that...

On the one hand, you'll lose all your customisations. On the other
hand, you'll get a nice fresh (prefs) file with no erroneous data.

If you move and rename your existing prefs file, then Word will create
a new one. If the size issue hasn't changed, delete the new prefs,
empty trash, and put the old one back to retrieve your customisations.

PhilD

 

[LouisF]

I think this may be built in. According to Help (topic "Copy an image from

a graphics program to a toolbar button or menu command") the default toolbar
icon is 20x20 pixels. In Word 2001/98, they were 16x16 pixels.

Ah! Now I understand! Clearly, this is the explanation. Thank you
Daiya. Yes, it is surprising that the issue can't be found in the
posting archives of any of the groups I have searched, as it must have
occurred to others as well. But as you say, that was quite some time
ago...

So, unless there is a way to modify that 20x20 pixels icon size, I
guess the only solution is a bigger screen... I will mark the topic as
patially solved.

Thanks and cheers to all who helped.

Louis

Just to clarify--this is not a problem that suddenly occurred, but it has
been the situation ever since you upgraded the computer to OS X and Office
2004?

I think this may be built in. According to Help (topic "Copy an image from
a graphics program to a toolbar button or menu command") the default toolbar
icon is 20x20 pixels. In Word 2001/98, they were 16x16 pixels.

I'm sure they did this deliberately to compensate for higher resolutions,
and in fact, going from my OS 9 notebook to my OS X notebook (with a much
higher resolution), the toolbar actually looks *smaller* in Word 2004 than
Word 2001/98. And I *still* have to keep the text at 125% zoom to be happy
with it.

I think not that many people went from OS 9 to OS X with Word 2004 on the
same computer/monitor, and that's why the problem hasn't come up, or may
have come up a long time ago and been forgotten. I wonder where Office X
fell, though, I would think it would have been noticed then on one end of
that transition.

Maybe someone else will have more information, though. Any Apple Store or
university bookstore or anyplace that sells macs nearby, where you could go
check if they all have this problem?