Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated March 17, 2018)
This tip applies to Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003
Jack has a system that has Word 2003 installed on it. He is trying to make changes to the Standard and Formatting toolbars, but whenever he quits Word and restarts, those changes are all gone—the toolbars are back to their default conditions.
There are a couple of things that could be causing the problem. First, it is important to understand that changes to the toolbars are stored in the Normal.dot template file. If the template is not saved, then the changes won't be persistent; they won't be available the next time you use Word.
If you are working on a network, you need to check to see if your Normal.dot file has been configured to reside on a shared network drive. If so, the file could be overwritten by others on your network who are using the same file. It is also possible that the file is on a protected network directory so that it cannot be changed. If either of these is a possibility, talk to your network admin and see what can be done to use your own Normal.dot instead of the same as everyone else.
The more likely problem, however, is that you may have a problematic version of Adobe Acrobat on your system. Some versions of Acrobat have this annoying habit of ensuring that any changes you've made to Normal.dot are not saved automatically. Instead, you need to explicitly save the changes. One way to do this is to make sure you use Save All after making changes to your toolbars. To see this command, hold down the Shift key as you click the File menu. You'll notice that the Save command has been replaced with Save All. Select this option, and the currently open document is saved, along with any templates—including Normal.dot.
If you prefer, you can add the Save All option to your File menu so that it appears all the time. Follow these steps:
Figure 1. The Commands tab of the Customize dialog box.
Now, it is important that you click the new Save All command right away. Why? Because you've just made a configuration change that is saved in Normal.dot. If you exit Word without making sure that Normal.dot is saved (by clicking Save All), then the change isn't saved, and the next time you start Word the menu will be back to normal.
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2024-01-05 21:30:55
Jim
Fantastic, Allen! This tip worked perfectly. I tried a number of suggestions without success before lucking onto your solution. "Save all"...never heard of it. Thanks!
2021-07-14 11:16:16
Chris
Hi Folks,
I have written many macros and created toolbars for all the buttons in Word 2003. Unfortunately, I did this a very long time ago and I don't remember so much of what I knew back then. I remember that there was a file other than Normal.dot that recorded much of this, but I can't remember anything -- the location, the name, or the extension. I do remember that a copy of this file would populate my toolbars and the buttons on them. Can you refresh my memory?
Thanks for the help,
Chris.
2019-10-27 08:07:05
CLW
I am using MS Word 2013. The instructions for viewing the 'Save All' command don't work for this version. I had to add the 'Save All' Command to the quick access toolbar first. Then I followed the above suggestion when adding the toolbar customization that I originally wanted, and it worked. Thanks!
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