Script Question... Is this possible

[Brendan]

Don't know if this goes here or in another Microsoft Category:

We have about 30 computers in our company and have created numerous
templates for various uses. The templates have been placed in a central
location on one of the servers in a directory called FORMS. There are also
four sub-directories that contain various forms (for navigation purposes).

Two Current Problems:
1. Many of the non-computer type users have to right click on the specific
template or document and Save-As in order to save the template to a document
file. This is because the document opens up in Internet Explorer.
2. The current folder, when navigated to via our Intranet (not internet) is
very raw looking.

What I would like to do is have each user of MS Word be able to access these
templates directly from their local template directory (ie. File, New, From
Computer). Is there a way to create a script that would populate a user’s
template directory with the forms?

The script would have to check for a directory named “Company†and then
populate it with the templates from a specific directory where I keep all of
the templates. If the directory was not found, it would create it then
populate it. I want the user to have a tab in the templates directory named
“Company†where all of our custom templates can be pulled from.

OR is there a way to create the director called “Company†and have it point
to a specific directory where I only control and house the templates. Having
it point to a specific directory would be easier in theory because the
template could be changed on the “fly†but I don’t know if that is possible.

 

[Rob]

The way we have it set up here, which seems to be hinted at in your "OR"
section, the users point their Workgroup Templates (Tools->Options->File
Locations) to their respective network directory. I can change templates "on
the fly" but only if no one has opened any of them. So I have test copies of
everything, make the changes there then copy them over in the morning before
anyone gets in. There might be a better way but this is the way it's been for
years.

 

[Jonathan West]

The way we have it set up here, which seems to be hinted at in your "OR"
section, the users point their Workgroup Templates (Tools->Options->File
Locations) to their respective network directory.

There are various reasons I recommend not using that arrangement, including
the following

1. There is a bug in Word - if you attempt to open a document based on a
network template, and the network location isn't available, Word can freeze
for several minutes while it waits to see if there might eventually be a
response from the required network location. There is a hotfix for the
problem, but if you send documents outside the company, there is no way to
guarantee that your customers will have installed the hotfix.

2. If the network or server goes down, all word-processing grinds to a halt
because the templates aren't available. Quite enough other operations will
halt without unnecessarily adding word processing to the list.

3. The template can't be updated if some user happens to have left a PC on
overnight with a document open.

4. Network templates add unnecessarily to network loading - increasing
response times for other network apps. Perhaps not by much, but it isn't
necessary.

5. Locally stored templates generally open faster.

6. If you have any VBA code in the templates, I have found that the VBA
occasionally behaves differently if the template is open concurrently by two
users. I've no means of predicting when this will happen, but I have been
able to reproduce it reliably when it has occurrred.

It is quite straightforward to create a batch file or vbscript file, and
have it run from a login script to copy updated templates from a central
location to a specified location on the user's local drive. Any competent
network admin should be able to do this. Alternatively, for larger networks,
SMS is designed for this specific purpose (among many others).


--
Regards
Jonathan West - Word MVP
www.intelligentdocuments.co.uk
Please reply to the newsgroup
Keep your VBA code safe, sign the ClassicVB petition www.classicvb.org

 

[Brendan]

That is the way I was heading. But I need a script to go out and hunt down
each user on each computer ever time because we have three different shifts
of users and trying to have them do it via email instructions will be tedious.

 

[Karl E. Peterson]

1. There is a bug in Word - if you attempt to open a document based on a
network template, and the network location isn't available, Word can freeze
for several minutes while it waits to see if there might eventually be a
response from the required network location. There is a hotfix for the
problem,

Do you have a pointer to that hotfix? Thanks!

 

[Brendan]

5. Locally stored templates generally open faster.

Can I update a locally opened template if the user has left it open overnight?

 

[Jonathan West]

Can I update a locally opened template if the user has left it open
overnight?

No, but if you have a login script, it will run when the user next logs in,
at which time Word will not be open and so all the templates can be
replaced.


--
Regards
Jonathan West - Word MVP
www.intelligentdocuments.co.uk
Please reply to the newsgroup
Keep your VBA code safe, sign the ClassicVB petition www.classicvb.org

 

[Jonathan West]

Do you have a pointer to that hotfix? Thanks!

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/830561/en-us?spid=2530&sid=49
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/823372/


--
Regards
Jonathan West - Word MVP
www.intelligentdocuments.co.uk
Please reply to the newsgroup
Keep your VBA code safe, sign the ClassicVB petition www.classicvb.org

 

[Karl E. Peterson]

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/830561/en-us?spid=2530&sid=49
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/823372/

Very much appreciated, Jonathan. I think implementing your update script notion is
probably best, but I have users who'll stay logged on for weeks on end just to
thwart IT from messing with their machines. (Not that there's anything wrong with
that! <g>)