Backing Up Your AutoText Entries

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated January 21, 2020)
This tip applies to Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003


AutoText allows you assign text or graphics to a keyword and then replace the keyword with the text or graphics whenever you want. If you have been a long-time user of Word, chances are pretty good that you have developed quite a few AutoText entries for things like signature blocks in letters, boilerplate text, and long, hard-to-spell words.

Assuming you have quite a few AutoText entries, you may be wondering how you can back up those entries so they can be moved to a different computer. It is quite easy to do, really. All you need to do is back up your template files. This is where the AutoText entries are stored.

It is a good bet that most of your commonly used AutoText entries are in the Normal template file, so backing up this file will help you retain the majority of your information. Many Word users, however, also store AutoText entries in other template files. For instance, you may only have your AutoText entry for your signature block stored in the template you use to create letters.

To be safe, you can use the Find File feature to locate all the DOT files on your system. These can then be quickly copied to some backup medium, such as a CD-ROM, a memory drive, or to another disk location.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (1088) applies to Microsoft Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Getting Rid of Negative Zero Amounts

Have you ever seen a worksheet in which some zero values have a negative sign in front of them? There's a reason for ...

Discover More

Disabling Shift Key Use when Opening a Workbook

Open up a workbook, and Excel normally runs the macros associated with that workbook. You can disable the automatic ...

Discover More

Proper Comparisons for Dates in Merge Fields

How Word merges a data source with a document is controlled by merge fields. In those fields you may want to compare ...

Discover More

Create Custom Apps with VBA! Discover how to extend the capabilities of Office 2013 (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Access) with VBA programming, using it for writing macros, automating Office applications, and creating custom applications. Check out Mastering VBA for Office 2013 today!

More WordTips (menu)

Wrong Suggested Date

When you start to type a date into a document, Word helpfully suggests a full date that you can accept. The result is ...

Discover More

Restoring or Recreating AutoText Entries

When you first install Word, it includes a number of pre-defined AutoText entries. If you delete any of these entries ...

Discover More

Defining Protected Sections as AutoText

AutoText is a very useful tool. But what if the text you want to use when creating an AutoText entry is protected and you ...

Discover More
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is 2 + 2?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)


This Site

Got a version of Word that uses the menu interface (Word 97, Word 2000, Word 2002, or Word 2003)? This site is for you! If you use a later version of Word, visit our WordTips site focusing on the ribbon interface.

Videos
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.