Who ate Excel Standard and Formatting Toolbars?

[realrose89]

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

I recently began using Excel 2008 heavily, having worked casually with it earlier.
However, each time I open a new or current .xlsx workbook, the 1) standard and 2) formatting toolbars are missing, even though they show as checked in the VIEW drop down menu. When I uncheck and recheck, the toolbars show-up highly condensed in the upper far left corner and I have to go there to open the tools. As soon as this is accomplished, the worksheet tabs at the bottom of the sheet disappear. So I need to hit the round green "+" button to get everything visible at one time. It is such a tease...
Does anyone have any idea how to get these tools to comply? Could it have anything to do with my using a dual monitor? I connected a larger monitor several months ago to get a larger screen than the 13 inch Macbook's, so I do not miss so much off on the right side of the page.
Any suggestions?

 

[JE McGimpsey]

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

I recently began using Excel 2008 heavily, having worked casually with it
earlier.
However, each time I open a new or current .xlsx workbook, the 1) standard
and 2) formatting toolbars are missing, even though they show as checked in
the VIEW drop down menu. When I uncheck and recheck, the toolbars show-up
highly condensed in the upper far left corner and I have to go there to open
the tools. As soon as this is accomplished, the worksheet tabs at the bottom
of the sheet disappear. So I need to hit the round green "+" button to get
everything visible at one time. It is such a tease...
Does anyone have any idea how to get these tools to comply? Could it have
anything to do with my using a dual monitor? I connected a larger monitor
several months ago to get a larger screen than the 13 inch Macbook's, so I do
not miss so much off on the right side of the page.
Any suggestions?

Well, the first thing you should try is clicking the toolbar control
button (the white chicklet at the upper right of the window). XL08
windows conform to the Apple standard for hiding toolbars.

One the toolbars are showing, close XL to save the preference.

Note that XL08 hasn't played well with dual monitors in the past. MacBU
has said they're working on it. However, I've never heard of the problem
persisting when switching back to a single screen.

 

[realrose89]

Whew! J. E. McGimpsey - That reply was good timing!

Well, the first thing you should try is clicking the toolbar control
button (the white chicklet at the upper right of the window). XL08
windows conform to the Apple standard for hiding toolbars.

How was I supposed to know about that toolbar control button?
1) The first time I clicked it, nothing happened.
2) The second time, it worked like a charm. Both toolbars popped up full width, and the bottom tabs stayed put, just like it's supposed to look.
3) Then I closed the file, closed excel, opened excel and the file, and ALL toolbars were just as I left them earlier.

Earlier this year and last year when I was working with a single screen, I never saw this illogical opening. And repeatedly opening a 12-sheet workbook without immediate tool access has been driving me up a wall.

Thanks!!

 

[JE McGimpsey]

How was I supposed to know about that toolbar control button?

IIRC, it was first introduced in Mac OS X 10.2 (Jaguar) back in, what,
2002? and has been part of the OS ever since.

However, not all applications use it (but the one app that *every* Mac
user uses, the Finder, does).

Office 2008 is the first version of Office to have toolbars in the
document windows, so the first version to implement the toolbar control.

 

[d2]

I am new to Macs ... did not ever see the "chiclet". This post made my day!
Thx