Keep Office vX with Office 2008?

[Norm]

Should I?

I now find I'm using Office 2008 almost exclusively. Is there any reason
to keep Office vX?

Can one move their "My Templates" from one version to another (vX to
2008 in my case)? Or do I start fresh?

Thanks for any tips.

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Should I?

I now find I'm using Office 2008 almost exclusively. Is there any reason
to keep Office vX?

Can one move their "My Templates" from one version to another (vX to
2008 in my case)? Or do I start fresh?

Thanks for any tips.

Hi,

As long as you don't need Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) or
anything that relies on VBA you can switch completely to Office 2008.

In 2008, templates are no longer stored in the Applications folder (this
is a good thing). You can move your tempaltes to this folder in your
User directory:
Username (click the little house icon under Places in
Finder):Library:Application Support:Microsoft:Office:User Templates:My
Templates

Moving your templates to this new location will make them available on
the New tab of Project Gallery and File > Open and switch the type to
templates. It also protects your templates from being deleted if for
some reason you dragged the Microsoft Office 2008 application folder to
the trash.

 

[Tim Streater]

Hi,

As long as you don't need Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) or
anything that relies on VBA you can switch completely to Office 2008.

In 2008, templates are no longer stored in the Applications folder (this
is a good thing). You can move your tempaltes to this folder in your
User directory:
Username (click the little house icon under Places in
Finder):Library:Application Support:Microsoft:Office:User Templates:My
Templates

Moving your templates to this new location will make them available on
the New tab of Project Gallery and File > Open and switch the type to
templates. It also protects your templates from being deleted if for
some reason you dragged the Microsoft Office 2008 application folder to
the trash.

One of the most *irritating* things about Word is how hard it works to
prevent me storing my templates where I want - like, in various places.
As soon as I decide I want to save some doc as a template, it changes --
without so much as a by-your-leave -- the folder in the Save/Save-As
dialogue to its own idea of where templates should go.

This simply doubles the amount of navigating I have to do in the
dialogue and irritates the *crap* out of me.

 

[John McGhie]

One of the most *irritating* things about Word is how hard it works to
prevent me storing my templates where I want - like, in various places.
As soon as I decide I want to save some doc as a template, it changes --
without so much as a by-your-leave -- the folder in the Save/Save-As
dialogue to its own idea of where templates should go.

This simply doubles the amount of navigating I have to do in the
dialogue and irritates the *crap* out of me.

Hi Tim:

At least they fixed the bug that wouldn't allow you to use them from
anywhere BUT the Templates folder

This coercive mechanism was added around Word 6/97 time to help users who
had no real concept of "folders". There are users who just scatter files at
random. And in those days, it used to prevent templates from working.

Cheers

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

--

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[Norm]

As long as you don't need Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) or
anything that relies on VBA you can switch completely to Office 2008.

In 2008, templates are no longer stored in the Applications folder (this
is a good thing). You can move your tempaltes to this folder in your
User directory:
Username (click the little house icon under Places in
Finder):Library:Application Support:Microsoft:Office:User Templates:My
Templates

Moving your templates to this new location will make them available on
the New tab of Project Gallery and File > Open and switch the type to
templates. It also protects your templates from being deleted if for
some reason you dragged the Microsoft Office 2008 application folder to
the trash.

Thanks. Helpful.

In your last sentence, do you mean Office vX?

 

[Tim Streater]

On 7/09/09 7:26 AM, in article
(e-mail address removed), "Tim Streater"
[snip]

One of the most *irritating* things about Word is how hard it works to
prevent me storing my templates where I want - like, in various places.
As soon as I decide I want to save some doc as a template, it changes --
without so much as a by-your-leave -- the folder in the Save/Save-As
dialogue to its own idea of where templates should go.

This simply doubles the amount of navigating I have to do in the
dialogue and irritates the *crap* out of me.

Hi Tim:

At least they fixed the bug that wouldn't allow you to use them from
anywhere BUT the Templates folder

This coercive mechanism was added around Word 6/97 time to help users who
had no real concept of "folders". There are users who just scatter files at
random. And in those days, it used to prevent templates from working.

John,

So is there any way to prevent it doing that? If I work with several
projects, each will have its own templates. I want to keep them in the
folder with the project they relate to, so that, later, I can zip up the
whole folder and send it off to someone else when I hand a project over.

 

[John McGhie]

On 7/09/09 7:26 AM, in article
(e-mail address removed), "Tim Streater"
[snip]

One of the most *irritating* things about Word is how hard it works to
prevent me storing my templates where I want - like, in various places.
As soon as I decide I want to save some doc as a template, it changes --
without so much as a by-your-leave -- the folder in the Save/Save-As
dialogue to its own idea of where templates should go.

This simply doubles the amount of navigating I have to do in the
dialogue and irritates the *crap* out of me.

Hi Tim:

At least they fixed the bug that wouldn't allow you to use them from
anywhere BUT the Templates folder

This coercive mechanism was added around Word 6/97 time to help users who
had no real concept of "folders". There are users who just scatter files at
random. And in those days, it used to prevent templates from working.

John,

So is there any way to prevent it doing that? If I work with several
projects, each will have its own templates. I want to keep them in the
folder with the project they relate to, so that, later, I can zip up the
whole folder and send it off to someone else when I hand a project over.

Hi Tim:

No, there is no way to prevent this behaviour, because the world is still
full of people who cannot tell the difference between a document and a
template

But you can add your favourite template folders to your "Places" in Finder
(in Column View). And if you do that, they're only one click away when you
want to Save As to them from Word

Cheers

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

--

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[CyberTaz]

Hi Tim;

On 7/09/09 7:26 AM, in article
(e-mail address removed), "Tim Streater"
[snip]

One of the most *irritating* things about Word is how hard it works to
prevent me storing my templates where I want - like, in various places.
As soon as I decide I want to save some doc as a template, it changes --
without so much as a by-your-leave -- the folder in the Save/Save-As
dialogue to its own idea of where templates should go.

This simply doubles the amount of navigating I have to do in the
dialogue and irritates the *crap* out of me.
Hi Tim:

At least they fixed the bug that wouldn't allow you to use them from
anywhere BUT the Templates folder

This coercive mechanism was added around Word 6/97 time to help users who
had no real concept of "folders". There are users who just scatter files at
random. And in those days, it used to prevent templates from working.

John,

So is there any way to prevent it doing that? If I work with several
projects, each will have its own templates. I want to keep them in the
folder with the project they relate to, so that, later, I can zip up the
whole folder and send it off to someone else when I hand a project over.

Hi Tim:

No, there is no way to prevent this behaviour, because the world is still
full of people who cannot tell the difference between a document and a
template

But you can add your favourite template folders to your "Places" in Finder
(in Column View). And if you do that, they're only one click away when you
want to Save As to them from Word

Cheers

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

--

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

Another option:

Put Aliases for your folders containing templates into the Templates folder
or the My Templates folder. It not only makes the locations immediately
accessible when you create a new template, but also facilitates organization
of your templates for easier access through the Project Gallery.

Additionally, Word> Preferences> File Locations allows you to set your own
preferred location for both User as well as Workgroup Templates.

I'm not questioning your methods whatsoever, but for me it makes far more
sense to have all templates accessible from as centralized a location as
possible rather than in potentially dozens of different directories. That
not only facilitates storing new ones but also expedites locating the one I
need when the time comes.

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

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

One of the most *irritating* things about Word is how hard it works to
prevent me storing my templates where I want - like, in various places.
As soon as I decide I want to save some doc as a template, it changes --
without so much as a by-your-leave -- the folder in the Save/Save-As
dialogue to its own idea of where templates should go.

This simply doubles the amount of navigating I have to do in the
dialogue and irritates the *crap* out of me.

Hi Tim,

From my perspective Office makes it easy to set any location as the
templates folder. The file path I mentioned earlier is the default
location for Office, but you can override the default Office template
folder from Word:

Use the File menu and choose Project Gallery
Click the Settings tab in the top bar of the Gallery.
In the File Locations Category click the link for Local Templates or
Workgroup templates to set the template file locations.

You can use any location you like. If choose a location in the
Applications directory then all users on the computer share the same
templates. If you choose a location in a User directory, such as the
Documents folder, the templates are kept private from other users of the
same computer.

-Jim

 

[Tim Streater]

Hi Tim,

From my perspective Office makes it easy to set any location as the
templates folder. The file path I mentioned earlier is the default
location for Office, but you can override the default Office template
folder from Word:

Use the File menu and choose Project Gallery
Click the Settings tab in the top bar of the Gallery.
In the File Locations Category click the link for Local Templates or
Workgroup templates to set the template file locations.

You can use any location you like. If choose a location in the
Applications directory then all users on the computer share the same
templates. If you choose a location in a User directory, such as the
Documents folder, the templates are kept private from other users of the
same computer.

Jim,

I'm not objecting to Office having somewhere that it thinks templates
should go - in particular as you point out, that can be modified. I
object to doing Save As, navigating to my destination folder, then
selecting Save as Template, and finding that Office has interfered with
my folder navigation. In other words, to get the effect I want I have to
do the two actions in a certain order - choose Save as Template *first*
and *then* navigate.

Not exactly user friendly.

I could envisage a button in the dialogue that selects the Template
folder, and that selecting Save as Template does not interfere with
navigation. You might say that most users would probably want templates
stored in one place. OK, so have it behave as now but that this be
optional so I can turn it off. Under those conditions, I'd be happy even
if that were the default.

As it is I turn off a lot of stuff that Office comes set with anyway.
I'd like an expert mode and if the next Mac-Office follows Word 2007
then I'll want it even more.

 

[John McGhie]

Jim,

I'm not objecting to Office having somewhere that it thinks templates
should go - in particular as you point out, that can be modified. I
object to doing Save As, navigating to my destination folder, then
selecting Save as Template, and finding that Office has interfered with
my folder navigation. In other words, to get the effect I want I have to
do the two actions in a certain order - choose Save as Template *first*
and *then* navigate.

Not exactly user friendly.

I could envisage a button in the dialogue that selects the Template
folder, and that selecting Save as Template does not interfere with
navigation. You might say that most users would probably want templates
stored in one place. OK, so have it behave as now but that this be
optional so I can turn it off. Under those conditions, I'd be happy even
if that were the default.

As it is I turn off a lot of stuff that Office comes set with anyway.
I'd like an expert mode and if the next Mac-Office follows Word 2007
then I'll want it even more.

Hi Tim:

I am sure it will, and so will I

Please use Help>Send Feedback in Word to register your "Suggestion" about
"Expert Mode". The more "votes" they get for it, the more likely it is to
happen...

Cheers

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

--

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[Tim Streater]

Hi Tim:

I am sure it will, and so will I

Please use Help>Send Feedback in Word to register your "Suggestion" about
"Expert Mode". The more "votes" they get for it, the more likely it is to
happen...

Righto.