Hide wbk files?

  • Thread starter Thread starter GB
  • Start date Start date
G

GB

I would like to hide the wbk files on my wife's computer, purely because she
opens them and then gets confused as she can't edit them and they are not
the latest version and so on. Yes, I know....

One simple solution is for word to set the hidden attribute on the backup
files when it renames them. Is there any way to do that?

Alternatively, can I at least get Word to call them all zzBackup instead of
Backup, so they end up at the bottom of the file list?
 
GB said:
I would like to hide the wbk files on my wife's computer, purely
because she opens them and then gets confused as she can't edit them
and they are not the latest version and so on. Yes, I know....

One simple solution is for word to set the hidden attribute on the
backup files when it renames them. Is there any way to do that?

Alternatively, can I at least get Word to call them all zzBackup
instead of Backup, so they end up at the bottom of the file list?
Click to expand...


BTW, that's for word 2003.
 
If you use Word's File Open dialog, set to All Word Documents, you won't see
them. Beyond that, I don't know of any way to hide them except to manually
mark them as Hidden, which won't help if you have hidden files and folders
displayed. Why not just turn off "Automatically create backup copy" if this
setting is causing a problem?

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org
 
Suzanne said:
If you use Word's File Open dialog, set to All Word Documents, you
won't see them.
Click to expand...

She recently emailed someone the backup file, using gmail. So, simply having
them visible with the explorer is an issue.
Beyond that, I don't know of any way to hide them
except to manually mark them as Hidden, which won't help if you have
hidden files and folders displayed.
Click to expand...

That's easy to turn off, of course, but I can't find any automatic way to
make them hidden in the first place.
Why not just turn off
"Automatically create backup copy" if this setting is causing a
problem?
Click to expand...

Well, she occasionally messes up big-time, in which case the wbk files are
potentially helpful.

It occurs to me that there's probably a document save event that I could use
to trigger a vba macro? Then just run through all the wbk files in the
directory to make them all hidden. Any thoughts on that?
 
Yes, this would work. I'm cross-posting this to a developer group that may
be able to help with the VBA.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org
 
There's probably a more elegant way, but one would be to create a class that sinks
application events, as Dave Rado outlines here:

http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/MacrosVBA/AppClassEvents.htm

Then, set a short-duration timer whenever the DocumentBeforeSave event fires, noting
the location where the document is to be saved. When the timer elapses, check for a
backup at that location, and do what needs to be done. Setting a hidden attribute
is pretty easy, using the SetAttr statement.

I'm sure there are more elegant ways to attack this, but they'd probably involve
more work to rig up too.
 
Karl said:
There's probably a more elegant way, but one would be to create a class that sinks
application events, as Dave Rado outlines here:

http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/MacrosVBA/AppClassEvents.htm

Then, set a short-duration timer whenever the DocumentBeforeSave event fires,
noting the location where the document is to be saved. When the timer elapses,
check for a backup at that location, and do what needs to be done. Setting a
hidden attribute is pretty easy, using the SetAttr statement.

I'm sure there are more elegant ways to attack this, but they'd probably involve
more work to rig up too.
Click to expand...

No sooner did I post, that one occurred to me. Using that class-based technique to
catch DecumentBeforeSave events is still the key. But forget about timers and such.
Just create the backup yourself when this event fires! It can be wherever, with
whatever attributes, would be appropriate.
 
Is there a reason that you can't teach her not to open a .wbk file? It seems
that it's better to give her the tools to do this right rather than fiddle
around with all of this and allow her to be uneducated in this area. My
husband taught me most of my basic computer skills and because of his
patience, I've been able to develop them even further. (I still enjoy the
time we spend together sharing information with him. Okay, we're geeks, but
we're happy geeks with a common interest.)
 
You could run a batch file that moves them to another directory. I have one
called TEMPBACK, and I run a batch file called CLEANUP.BAT that periodically
moves .wbk, .tmp and .bak files there.
 
Steve,
Could you share the content of your bat file that moves the wbk fies to a new directory?
Ideally that would be a subfolder named backups...
I used to write bat files 20 years ago in DOS, but am hesitant to start experimenting now...
That may mess up the whole computer. But if you have one,that would be handy.
Also, would it do this for all folders? Still little scary, there is so many of them...
Max

Steve Hayes said:
On Wed, 11 Mar 2009 18:22:36 -0000, "GB" wrote:



You could run a batch file that moves them to another directory. I have one
called TEMPBACK, and I run a batch file called CLEANUP.BAT that periodically
moves .wbk, .tmp and .bak files there.


--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://hayesfam.bravehost.com/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://methodius.blogspot.com
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk
Click to expand...
 
any luck with finding the solution?

GB,
any luck with finding the solution for automatic hiding of the .wbk files?
I think it would make my folders much more neat...
Max
 
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