Replies

Your list is reasonably close to what I do. I also to repartitioning similar to what Dave Leippe described. I was somewhat surprised that you didn’t mention anti-malware of any sort.

It is nice to finally see someone suggesting regular backups as part of initial setup.

All of the complexities you mention are there in menu customizations, just hidden by lots of programming.

This link might help in your quest:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/2009.05.ribbon.aspx – A Guide to Customizing the Office 2007 Ribbon

it has links lists of some of the hidden id’s you are looking for and it includes this snip of information to help:

4.8 SHARING YOUR CUSTOMIZATIONS
You can save UI customizations in any 2007 Office system Word, Excel, or PowerPoint document, template, or add-in. What if you want to install your custom UI so it’s available regardless of the document or template being used? This is also quite easy.
In Word, just save the .dotm file that contains your macros and related customUI to the Word Startup folder and it will load automatically when Word starts.

Over the last 3-4 years I’ve been collecting articles on the topic of Ribbon customization. So here it is, the link collection. It’s pretty overwhelming, but there is a lot of good stuff in it (not just the links themselves, but they also have lots of links to great resources).

Customizing The Ribbon
1 Links & Resources Collection
You can find more information about the topics discussed in this column at the following locations:
• Add Classic Form Controls to Ribbon – http://gregmaxey.mvps.org/Classic%20Form%20Controls.htm
• Change the Ribbon in Excel 2007 or Excel 2010 (very good, lots of links and example code) – http://www.rondebruin.nl/ribbon.htm
• Compatibility of Legacy Solutions and Customizations – http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=5ae8ea78-6ba9-4de4-aabd-2616d010caa7&DisplayLang=en
• Creating Custom Ribbon Galleries in Excel 2007 – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd756403%28office.12%29.aspx
• Customize the Ribbon (It doesn’t take Rocket Science) http://gregmaxey.mvps.org/Customize_Ribbon.htm
• Customize the Ribbon (It doesn’t take Rocket Science) – http://gregmaxey.mvps.org/Customize_Ribbon.htm
• Customizing Context Menus in Office 2010 – http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=182186
• Customizing the 2007 Office Fluent Ribbon for Developers – Part 1 of 3 Oct 2006 – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa338202.aspx
• Customizing the 2007 Office Fluent Ribbon for Developers – Part 1 of 3 – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa338199.aspx
• Customizing the 2007 Office Fluent Ribbon for Developers (Part 1 of 3) – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa338202(v=office.12).aspx
• Customizing the 2007 Office Fluent Ribbon for Developers (Part 2 of 3) – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa338199(v=office.12).aspx
• Customizing the 2007 Office Fluent Ribbon for Developers (Part 3 of 3) – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa722523(v=office.12).aspx
• Customizing the Office 2010 Backstage View for Developers – http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=184245
• Customizing the Word 2007 Fluent Ribbon Is As Easy As 1-2-3 (Part 1 of 2) – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc501317(v=office.12).aspx
• Customizing the Word 2007 Fluent Ribbon Is As Easy As 1-2-3 (Part 2 of 2) – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc508991(v=office.12).aspx
• Deploying a Customized Ribbon and Quick Access Toolbar in Office 2010 – http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=184247&clcid=0x409
• Display and Hide Tabs, Groups, and Controls on the Microsoft Office Ribbon (Part 1 of 2) http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee390805(office.11).aspx
• Display and Hide Tabs, Groups, and Controls on the Microsoft Office Ribbon (Part 2 of 2) http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee633442(office.11).aspx
• Excel 2007-2010 Ribbon and QAT pages – http://www.rondebruin.nl/tips.htm
• Galleries in the Ribbon – http://www.rondebruin.nl/galleries.htm
• Guide to Customizing the Office 2007 Ribbon – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/2009.05.ribbon.aspx
• How to Build an Office COM Add-in by Using Visual Basic .NET – http://support.microsoft.com/kb/302896/EN-US/
• How to Create Office COM Add-ins by Using VBA and Office Developer – http://support.microsoft.com/kb/306130/EN-US
• http://gregmaxey.mvps.org/Ribbon_Images_Labels_Part1.htm
• http://gregmaxey.mvps.org/Ribbon_Images_Labels_PartII.htm
• http://gregmaxey.mvps.org/Ribbon_Images_Labels_PartIII.htm
• http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff468686.aspx
• Information About Designing Office XP Add-ins and Office 2003 Add-ins by Using the .NET Framework – http://support.microsoft.com/?id=840585
• Installing Add-Ins 2007 – http://www.andypope.info/tips/tip010.htm
• Introduction to the Office 2010 Backstage View for Developers – http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=182189
• Office 2007 : Icons Gallery – http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=12B99325-93E8-4ED4-8385-74D0F7661318&displaylang=en
• Office 2010 : Icons Gallery – http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=2d3a18a2-2e75-4e43-8579-d543c19d0eed
• Office Development with Visual Studio Developer Portal – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/office/aa905533.aspx
• Office Fluent User Interface Developer Portal – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/office/aa905530.aspx
• Programatically customizing 2007 Office Fluent UI – http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/bb335359.aspx
• Ribbon Extensibility in Office 2010: Tab Activation and Auto-Scaling – http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=184248&clcid=0x409
• Ron’s Excel Tips
• Targeting User Interface Solutions to the 2007 and 2010 Releases of Microsoft Office – http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=184298
1.1 IMPORT 2003 TOOLBARS INTO RIBBON
• Compatibility of Legacy Solutions and Customizations – http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=5ae8ea78-6ba9-4de4-aabd-2616d010caa7&DisplayLang=en
• DIY Custom Toolbar in Word 2007 – http://hdsurvivor.blogspot.com/2007/10/custom-toolbar-in-word-2007.html
• Icon Customization – http://en.allexperts.com/q/Microsoft-Word-1058/2007-icon-customizaton.htm
• Migrating 2003 macros and toolbars to 2007 – http://lounge.windowssecrets.com/index.php?showtopic=772844
• Use Word 2000/3 Toolbars in Word 2007 – http://www.gmayor.com/Toolbars_in_word_2007.htm
1.2 RIBBON XML EDITORS
• Custom Ribbon Icons – http://gregmaxey.mvps.org/Ribbon_Custom_Icons.htm
• Custom UI Editor Tool download from the OpenXMLDeveloper.org The tool was written by Trang Luu who works on the Microsoft Office Fluent User Interface team and is one of the key developers of the Ribbon. The Custom UI Editor is specifically written to customize the Ribbon in Microsoft Office applications.
• Customize the Office User Interface in Office 2010 – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff468686.aspx
• Documentation: Visual Studio Tools for Office – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/d2tx7z6d.aspx
• Forum: Visual Studio Tools for Office – http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/forums/en-US/vsto/threads/
• RibbonX Visual Designer – Free Ribbon customizing tool – http://www.andypope.info/vba/ribboneditor.htm
• RibbonX Visual Designer Add-in (made by Andy Pope) – http://www.andypope.info/vba/ribboneditor.htm
• RibbonX: Customizing the Office 2007 Ribbon – http://www.amazon.com/RibbonX-Customizing-Office-2007-Ribbon/dp/0470191112 – Book
• RibbonX: Excel 2007 VBA Programmer’s Reference – – Chapter 14- – http://www.oaltd.co.uk/Excel2007ProgRef/Default.htm
• XML Notepad 2007 – http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=72d6aa49-787d-4118-ba5f-4f30fe913628&displaylang=en is another free tool from Microsoft that you can use when writing XML code.

Word 2003 Tools / Options / compatibility tab
Word 2007 Office button / Word Options button / Advanced Option / Layout Options (right at very bottom, you have to click on it to expand the list)
Word 2010 File tab / Options / Advanced option / Layout Options (right at very bottom, you have to click on it to expand the list)

Try turning on one or more or all of these options:

“Suppress extra line spacing at bottom of page”
“Suppress extra line spacing at the top of page”
“Suppress extra line spacing at top of page the way Word 5.x for the Mac does”
“Suppress extra line spacing the way WordPerfect 5.x does”
“Suppress Space Before after a hard page or column break”

Turning on the options will only affect the current document. If you want them to be applied to new documents, you will have to open NORMAL.DOT template for editing, make the changes and save them. Even with the change saved in NORMAL.DOT, it will not be applied to existing documents. You will have to change them one at at time (good task for a recorded macro … )

One of my favorite layout options is “Do full justification the way WordPerfect 6.x for Windows does”. By default, Word is very “dumb” when doing full justification. It inserts full space characters between the words. The WP way also slightly expands the spacing between letters in words, much more subtle.

Does anyone know specifically what this option does?
“Use Line Breaking Rules”?

Does anyone have a link to a resource that defines / explains the various compatibility Options. The problem is that many of them were added long ago, they are not documented, and most people do not know what they do.

Not AFIK.

An approximation is the “Recent Files” list displayed in the Office button (or 2010 File tab) dialog. It shows a list of the files recently used. You also have the option of “Pinning” a file, clicking on the “poster pin” icon beside a file name, to “permanently” lock that file onto the list.

Recent files is controlled in the Office button / Word Options button / Advanced option / Display section / “Show this number of recent documents: ??” You can display up to 49 files, but I prefer to limit the list to what can be displayed on screen without scrolling.

In 2010 there is an “Open Recent Files” command in the “Popular Commands” list that you can put on the QAT to take you directly to the Recent files display. However, rather than mousing, I prefer to simply use the keyboard shortcuts: F R. I couldn’t find a similar command in 2007, it might be there, I just didn’t see it.

Thanks for the report. This sounds like an interesting upgrade possibility for my laptop. Although I might wait a little longer until this technology is not quite so bleeding edge.

“was a wash”
if you read the whole quote:
{snip}
Power consumption is always an important consideration with notebooks. In most tests, such as those in AnandTech.com’s May 24 review, the difference between hybrid and traditional platter drives was a wash.
{/snip}

You’d realize the performance wash mentioned relates to power consumption, not read/write performance.

She did write that there were noticeable performance improvement in specific cases. Oh yes, by “wash” they mean that power consumption was roughly equal, the reduced power used to read/write the platters was used by power requirement to keep flash memory powered.

I imagine the biggest boot performance boost would come if the manufacturer, or better yet MS, was to provide a disk driver that would at least offer the option to load the boot prefetch files into the flash memory during shutdown. Trade a slightly longer shutdown for faster boot.

I sympathize completely with your preference for keyboard over mouse.

I haven’t been able to find it either. Are you sure the “Format Painter” won’t do the trick for you. Select a sample of the text with the formatting you want to copy. Click on the format painter icon (the paintbrush), then select the text you want to apply the formatting to. If you double click the tool it stays selected and you can apply the formatting to multiple separate locations in the doc, use key to cancel painter. You can find it in the QAT, Choose commands from: Home tab, “Format Painter”

MS has created several tools to help the migration from 2003 menu to 2007/2010 ribbons. One tool is a set of applets (flash or silverlight) that allow you to click on a command in a 2003 menu then the applet displays the 2007 or 2010 ribbon and locates the matching command. They have online and download versions of these applets. I prefer the downloaded ones to reduce internet access.

The other tool is a set of spreadsheets that does the same thing in text form.

The 2003 to 2007 set can be found at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/training/guides-to-the-ribbon-use-office-2003-menus-to-learn-the-office-2007-user-interface-HA010229584.aspx

The 2003 to 2010 set can be found at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook-help/learn-where-menu-and-toolbar-commands-are-in-office-2010-HA101794130.aspx

Don’t forget, you can “highjack” the shortcuts back. At the bottom of the “Customize Quick Access Toolbar …” dialog there is a “Keyboard shortcuts: Customize” button. It displays a dialog. Select the command and apply the shortcut you want. It will show other commands, such as the add-in, that use your desired shortcut. Then you can confirm your selection and be back to normal.

In that dialog, you could also try the “Reset all…” button to reset to default all shortcuts. That may disable the “highjacking” done by the addin, I have’t tried it myself.

I did not move to 2007, primarily because of the ribbon, but am now finding that I will have no choice about moving to 2010.

What resources are available which will allow me to:

[*]focus on the keyboard with as little disruption as possible to the habits formed by my fingers (i.e., Alt-f,r,r,tab to insert a cross-reference by chosing from the list of bookmarks in the document)
[*]continue to use the templates created in Word 2003 (particularly the short-cut key combinations for particular formatting styles), either directly, or by re-doing them as required for Word 2010

I’ve seen reference to UBitMenu, which may get me past the ribbon, but what about templates & styles?

As an experienced, keyboard focused user, you are lucky to have skipped 2007. I am very much like you I learned touch typing on a manual typewriter, and when word processing “I hate meeces to pieces” .

Keyboard shortcuts. Basically you are out of luck. Although some of the ALT key sequences (ALT F, O, for Alt File, Open) have continued to be the same,enough of them have changed to constantly trip you up. You will have to learn new the combinations. One of the ways to learn the new menus is to use an applet called Ribbon Hero: http://www.officelabs.com/ribbonhero. OK, the applet is actually a “game”, but it is a valid learning tool.

As in 2003, you may continue customize your 2010 Shortcut keys (CTL/ALT/SHF + letter, ie CTL O for File Open) to apply specific shortcut keys to specific commands.

You mentioned the “menu” tab addins, Ubit specifically. So far I have not seen (haven’t looked for) any specific to 2010 or updated to 2010. The 2007 versions will sometimes work in 2010. Although I initially used them in 2007, I have been moving away from them, especially since installing to 2010 beta.

When you are searching (ie googling) for help about Office 2010, expand your search to include Office 2007 since they are very similar and many of the changes you see as part of the Ribbon Gooey (GUI) were actually introduced in 2007. Therefore the “what’s new” descriptions about them were done in Office 2007 articles.

Here are some links that you can mine to maybe find (partial) solutions to your problems:

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/support/getting-started-with-office-2010-FX101822272.aspx – MS’s “Get started with” site
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook-help/learn-where-menu-and-toolbar-commands-are-in-office-2010-HA101794130.aspx – This page is a gold mine. It has links Silverlight based apps that display 2003 menu, and when you click on menu command it morphs to display how to find the command in the 2010 ribbon. This page also has links to download spreadsheets mapping 2003 to 2010 commands. These spreadsheets are quite nicely done, much better than the much older versions.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc303401.aspx – Office 2010 Resource kit
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=e6dcc787-4653-49da-aeef-564a64dd4ac5 – Office 2010 Resource kit in help file format
http://www.officelabs.com/ribbonhero – a “game” that will help you learn the new ribbon

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=730978c2-432e-4496-a40e-59bd6ab1a37d&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+MicrosoftDownloadCenter+%28Microsoft+Download+Center%29#filelist – Office 2010 IT Professional User Readiness Resources: Readiness materials that help prepare the business for the deployment of Office 2010. Help get users in your company excited about Office 2010. Use these posters, flyers, and weekly e-mail templates to get people excited.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=9c45bba7-c08e-416c-8dcf-3a1b14bf1750&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+MicrosoftDownloadCenter+%28Microsoft+Download+Center%29#tm –

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word-help/CH010369478.aspx – MS Word 2010 training courses

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word-help/download-office-2010-training-HA101901726.aspx – Word 2010 Training- Make the Switch to Word 2010 (part of a series for whole office suite)

MS Word help- search for “Key Tips”

You can migrate menu based macros and toolbars into ribbon versions. Migration actually has the advantage of allowing you to more than the limited default set of icons. Here are some articles:
http://lounge.windowssecrets.com/index.php?showtopic=772844
http://www.gmayor.com/Toolbars_in_word_2007.htm

Gary and William’s answers are good.

http://word.tips.net/Pages/T007401_Modifying_Quick_Access_Toolbar_Images.html – This article provides links to a couple more options.

If you have macros or toolbars setup in 2003 you can import them into 2007 using this tip: http://lounge.windowssecrets.com/index.php?showtopic=772844

Thanks Gary. I don’t have AVG but I did remove Office 2003 and all programs related to it before trying to install Office 2010 x64. Same results! I then tried installing Office 2010 x32 with the same results. I am giving up (for now). Four days is enough hacking time for me. I do hate it when I can’t solve a problem though. Very frustrating.

Thanks to everyone for their input.

Based on the date of your first post and subsequent questionable IP locations I’d go for the refund. If you used a credit card, don’t wait, call the CC company to cancel the purchase. Then go out and buy a copy from a reputable source. It may cost a few dollars more, but what is 4 days of wasted time worth to you? While it is possible that the copy you got was (semi) legit because it was available to a couple of special distribution channels such as OEM’s and via Technet (as noted in another post), but general availability to the public was June 15th so any copy your purchased 10 days before that probably was not intended for resale to the general public.

It is possible to successfully install and run multiple versions of office on the same machine. I have been running legal copies of Office 2003 / 2007 for a couple of years on Vista 32 bit. I added the 2010 beta to the mix last October.

Here is a link that describes how to install multiple versions of Office: http://pubs.logicalexpressions.com/pub0009/LPMArticle.asp?ID=762
Basically, install in oldest to newest order. I like to make sure that I customize the installation to point to version specific folders to avoid overwriting common tools. A key usability point in this article is the section “Fixing the multiple office Lag”. As well, I like to put all of the Start Menu shortcuts in the same folder, tweaking the shortcut names, who needs to see “Microsoft Office Word 2003” yada yada yada ie

Excel 2003
Excel 2007
Excel 2010 B
Word 2003
Word 2007
Word 2010 B
…

If you install the “extra” office tools pay special attention the the names in the Start menu. I’ve noticed some versions use exactly the same name so you could “lose” some of the apps.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/928091 – Info About Using 2007 Office Suite on a computer that is running another version of Office. This is an “Official” MS take on the question, it basically says the same thing. A key point raised in this article is that you can only install only a single version of Outlook.

One more point that you might be stumbling on is trying to mix 32 and 64 bit versions of Office on the same machine. 32 bit COM addins won’t work in 64 bit office.

My first thought was “good idea”. But then I realized it was simply a MS scam. They peddle bug ridden software and expect everyone else to fix their problem.

The problem I have with it is the follow through. Sure it is easy enough for ISP to identify suspicious traffic and block it, then what. The ISP has to pay the cost of the support call to fix the problem? Works well for the M$ bottom line.

OK, granted MS isn’t the only one with buggy software but they have the market by a long shot.

In Office, it’s not just onenote that has OCR. Actually I never got around to trying onenote.

I recently learned that in the extra “Tools” that are installed with Office there is one called “Microsoft Office Document Imaging”. It opens TIF files and can OCR them. The few times I’ve tested it the OCR has been very good. The trick I particularly interested in was converting a PDF to TIF then using this tool to OCR it.

On the start menu, the shortcut to the tool is usually in a “Microsoft Office Tools” folder, in the Microsoft Office folder.

I’m with StuartR,

I think your best solution is outside of Word. Since you are dealing with a shared network drive, control access through the network. Allow everyone to have read-only access, and allow only one person/group to have read/update/create access.

If you have one heading that is different than the rest in the same style it sounds like you have manual formatting applied to that one line. Simply select that one line and clear the manual formatting using . It should revert to the default look of the style.

Embed fonts is the main answer, but there are other issues you should consider.

??? Exactly How did you create the example screen captures?

I’m guessing that you simply changed the currently selected printer within windows. This can be done via Word print dialog or “directly” via the Control Panel/Printers dialog. The printer simply has to be selected, it does not also have to be set to default. The currently selected printer affects how the document is displayed within the Word application as well as how it is printed. This means that each person who will be printing the doc has to have the appropriate printer/driver installed. This can be done by your IT people. Even if they take the shotgun approach and install it for everyone, everyone else doesn’t have to use it.

Another thing to consider is that these docs have gone through a lot of version change, from WP through several versions of Word. I suspect they are good candidates for corruption. As well, just looking at them I’m guessing there is a lot of “typewriter” type “manual” formatting. For example the lines above and below the “NOTES” are done with multiple minus characters instead of more advanced line functions. And in the “Applicability” it is obvious that you have manual line/paragraph breaks at the end of each line instead of just once at the end of each paragraph. And I’m willing to bet that tables, such as Condition / Required Action / Completion Time table is also setup manually rather than within a “proper” word table. Yes, this is the voice of experience speaking. I’ve had to play with such documents in the past.

The bottom line is that I’m suggesting you consider reformatting the docs completely from scratch. Do a SAVE AS to TEXT format, then copy the text into a brand new DOC. Apply NORMAL style to the whole doc and work you way through creating number lists, bullet lists tables, indents etc as required. You’ll find that para breaks and page breaks won’t match exactly, but just go with the flow where ever possible. Use the newer features to make the docs more “automatic”, so they require less manual control in the future. Create and name appropriate new styles as you go. The thing is

Of course, before making a change like this make sure you get management approval. And since the newest version of Word is a short time from release, you also might want to consider doing all the reformatting in Word 2010, saving to Word2007 DOCX format. This way all of your effort would be “future proofed” related to versions for a little longer. I’ve been using the 2010 Beta since it was released. It appears to be stable when using just basic formatting features. You won’t be using any of the new or really advanced features.