toolbox

[jennie_Clyne]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: intel

toolbox does not open. I can't get it to open from the menu bar or from the drop down view menu. It worked when I first loaded Office, now in the last week it has stopped working. how do I get it back?

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Word 2004 had an issue with the Formatting Palette flying off the
screen, it may have survived to Word 2008. Go to this page:
http://www.mcgimpsey.com/macoffice/office/formattingpalettegone.html
and at the bottom, you'll see a section about AppleScripting the
Formatting Palette. Run the script provided there to force the
Formatting Palette into a visible position on the window.

This is a bit of an experiment, so keep an eye on what happens so you
can give good details if it doesn't work.

 

[jennie_Clyne]

thanks for the suggestions. I followed the directions for the script.
copied it into script editor, compiled and ran it. no effect.
then I closed Word and saved the script, closed it and reopened it.
then ran it again. it opened Word and ran, however the formatting pallet is still not visible.

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Okay, so then that wasn't the cause of your problem. Glad that bug isn't
still around in 2008.

Test your preferences and Normal template as described in these pages:
http://word.mvps.org/Mac/MacWordNormal.html
http://word.mvps.org/Mac/DamagedPrefs.html

 

[CyberTaz]

Hi Jennie -

Try this: Right-Click (Control-Click) the Standard toolbar & select the
Reset Toolbar command. That may/may not work but it's worth a try

Let us know what happens. If that doesn't work it could be a corrupt
supporting file so we'll go from there.

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

 

[jennie_Clyne]

it is the toolbox not the toolbar that has disappeared. you know the set of pallets that can be selected from the view menu or the toolbox button on the toolbar. resetting the toolbar did not help.

checking damaged preferences and normal template did not help. the problem still exists in new template and with new preference file.

anything else?

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Okay. Standard diagnostic tricks to help locate the cause of the problem:

1) Log out of your user account, then hold down shift while logging back
in. If the problem disappears, it is probably due to some conflict with
the login items/utilities in your user account.

2) create a new user account in OS X and test in that one. If the
problem disappears, then the installation is fine but some user-specific
file has corrupted.

 

[jennie_Clyne]

that's it!
logging out, log back in holding shift key. toolbox appears
new user account, toolbox appears.

so what do I do to fix it? what does holding the shift key do when logging in? how do I figure out what is causing the conflict?

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Okay. Holding down the shift key when you login prevents your login
items from loading. Login Items are usually useful little applications
that run in the background doing stuff invisibly, and that are set to
launch automatically when you login. They are controlled in System
Preferences | Accounts | Login Items. When you install some utilities,
they automatically set themselves as login items, or let you do it
easily enough to not really notice.

I would say--go to Sys Prefs, make a note of what Login Items you have
loaded. Then turn them all off, using the minus icon to delete them.
Except one. Log out, log back in--does the problem appear? Does
shift-login still fix the problem? Then the problem must be caused by
single login item that you are still using.

Add the login items back, one by one, until one of them triggers the
problem. This is going to involve a lot of logging in and out. Test
anything you installed recently first. No one else has reported this
that I've seen, so it's probably not a well-known login item such as
Quicksilver causing it.

 

[jennie_Clyne]

thanks for your help. I will do as you suggest as soon as I finish my paper I am writing. IT sound like a time consuming effort and now that I have it working at the moment, I will finish what I am working on. I'll let you know what the item is that is causing the conflict so you can let others know.
Thanks