Standard toolbar missing?

[darrell_lim]

As i was frantically working on an assignment, i somehow managed to
lose my standard toolbar. i have gone into the toolbar menu to select
and deselect it. either option shows NO toolbar...ie nothing happens!
I have uninstalled/reinstalled microsoft office twice. but nothing
seems to work. I can select Word for macintosh 5.1 and that brings
back about half of the standard toolbar, but i just want to set it back
to its original settings. all the help online is meant for windows
systems. can anyone help me in Mac OSX 10.3.9 system? i have office
for mac 2004. thank you very very much!

 

[JE McGimpsey]

As i was frantically working on an assignment, i somehow managed to
lose my standard toolbar. i have gone into the toolbar menu to select
and deselect it. either option shows NO toolbar...ie nothing happens!
I have uninstalled/reinstalled microsoft office twice. but nothing
seems to work. I can select Word for macintosh 5.1 and that brings
back about half of the standard toolbar, but i just want to set it back
to its original settings. all the help online is meant for windows
systems. can anyone help me in Mac OSX 10.3.9 system? i have office
for mac 2004. thank you very very much!

First, uninstalling/reinstalling applications, while a favorite tactic
of Windows users, rarely if ever works on Macs. Applications just don't
get corrupted that often. It's usually the support files (such as
preferences) that are to blame, and unless you use the Remove Office
application, those are left behind.

Toolbars in Word are stored in templates, in this case your Normal
template. That's stored in your MUD (Microsoft User Data) folder.

Rename it. When you next start, Word will create a new Normal. If you
want to retain macros/styles/autotext from the old one, use the
Organizer (Tools/Templates and Add-ins/Organizer).

 

[lynn]

I'm on Sys 9 still (retrograde, I know), but have you explored
Tools/Customize and adding all the Standard commands to some existing
toolbar? You can get all functions back that way.

 

[darrell_lim]

i've thought about it, but i've never really had the time to customise
the toolbars, just cos i'm used to where the buttons i need are. but
after trying out JE's suggestion to no avail, i might have to do as you
suggested...thanks

 

[Clive Huggan]

i've thought about it, but i've never really had the time to customise
the toolbars, just cos i'm used to where the buttons i need are. but
after trying out JE's suggestion to no avail, i might have to do as you
suggested...thanks

Darrell,

Go for it! It will only take you a few minutes.

If you create toolbars containing only the buttons you want, taken from
Word's Standard and Formatting toolbars (so you can transfer customizations
via Organizer for backing up, whereas you can't do that with the default
toolbars). Then close the default toolbars once-off.

You'll find a discussion that might be useful on page 43 (under the heading
"Buttons, transferring between toolbars") of some notes on the way I use
Word for the Mac, titled "Bend Word to Your Will", which are available as a
free download from the Word MVPs' website
(http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/Bend/BendWord.htm).

Cheers,

Clive Huggan
Canberra, Australia
(My time zone is at least 7 hours different from the US and Europe, so my
follow-on responses to those regions can be delayed)
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[darrell_lim]

Clive. i took up your suggestion and after screwing up a few times, i
finally have my own customised toolbar! thanks for that convenience.
so whats the best way to back up this toolbar, in case something gets
corrupted again, and so i don't have to spend another hour trying to
remember to how to set it up? thanks again

 

[Clive Huggan]

Good to hear, Darrell!

Your next modification (or creation of a new toolbar) should take 5 minutes!

But if you're like me you will forget...

Four years ago I started to jot down reminder notes so I'd remember next
time, and look where that got me -- "Bend Word to Your Will"!

Format menu -> Style -> Organizer -> Toolbar, then navigate to the document
you want to transfer the toolbar to for backup purposes.

A good idea is to create a template (rather than a document, because it will
be easier to access in the foregoing process) called "Toolbar etc
storage.dot" or something like that, and store them there. But make sure to
back *that* up!

The notes in "Bend Word to Your Will" under the heading "Which files to back
up" on page 50 should help in this respect, especially the suggestions re
Word 2004. The effort is worth the peace of mind, and it only has to be done
once ;-)

Cheers,

Clive Huggan
Canberra, Australia
(My time zone is at least 7 hours different from the US and Europe, so my
follow-on responses to those regions can be delayed)
============================================================

 

[Darrell]

thanks for all your help! i'll try your suggestion. cheers!