Vista, VBA/macros and Word 97

  • Thread starter Thread starter Chris Game
  • Start date Start date
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Chris Game

What's the best way to set up Word 97 in Vista so that I can run
VBA/macros? I've managed to kludge it with 'Run as administrator'
and swapping the normal.dot files between the folder Vista fiddles
the templates into in the Users area [1](after this I can run in the
usual user account), and the \Program Files\...\Templates folder
that Office 97 tries to use, but it's a bit fiddly and prone to
loosing sync between the two normal.dot files. This is pushing
Office 97 further than it really should be, but anyone got a better
method?

[1] Clever this! Well done Vista!
 
I'm not sure exactly what you are asking. Your Normal.dot needs to be in the
Templates folder in the user profile, not the Programs folder. What I'm not
following is "loosing sync between the two Normal.dot files." There should
(and can) be only one "real" Normal.dot.

Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email cannot be acknowledged.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP

Coauthor of Word 2007 Inside Out:
http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/books/9801.aspx#AboutTheBook

Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/
 
I'm confused too. Normal.dot is specific to a User: it cannot be shared and
needs to be in the specific user's profile for that user to customize.

If you want macros to be used 'globally' by all users, save the macros to a
separate template then either install it the Word Startup folder for each
user, or install it in a folder on the server and change everyone's File
Location so that Startup points to the server folder.
 
I'm confused too. Normal.dot is specific to a User: it cannot be
shared and needs to be in the specific user's profile for that
user to customize.
Click to expand...

OK, and for Beth too, Office 97 has set up the templates in
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Templates\ , which in Vista would
present a problem with writing permissions, so Vista seems to have
used C:\Users\<MyUserName>\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Program
Files\Microsoft Office\Templates as a subsitute which Office97 is
fooled into believing is the original Templates folder.

Clear so far?

So normal.dot is, er, normally writable by the user (me) but
apparently can't hold macros. I can store macros and get VBA working
by changing permissions on various registry keys
(http://support.microsoft.com/kb/264743) and by opening Word using
'Run as administrator '. I would rather run as the normal user.

When running as administrator, Office uses the normal.dot file in
C:\Program Files\... rather than the one in the Users area. Even
though the account name is the same (it's all the one user account,
only the permissions change).

How to clean this up?

Thanks for the prompt responses, by the way!
 
How about you tell us what you are trying to accomplish exactly. I
understand that you encounter permission issues whit the Programs Folder.
Have you tried removing Normal.dot from the Programs folder? There should be
only one Normal.dot available to Word. That means only one Normal.dot should
be on your system, preferably in the User Profile. If you have multiple
copies then Word will start getting confused as which one to use, which I
think is the primary issue you are encountering.

Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email cannot be acknowledged.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP

Coauthor of Word 2007 Inside Out:
http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/books/9801.aspx#AboutTheBook

Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/
 
How about you tell us what you are trying to accomplish exactly.
Click to expand...

I thought I was clear enough - I was trying to get VBA running from
MS-Word.

I thought I might find someone who had tried this out, before
tweaking settings myself. I tried the obvious one any way, by
setting up a Templates folder in the Users area and pointing to that
in Tools -> Options. Rather to my surprise, it seemed to work fine.
I had wondered why that would have any different effect to the
behavior Vista showed through the use of the Virtual Store folder.
Anyway it seems to work now, other than the Clippy help not working.
 
I'm sorry, I thought your question was more along the lines of why you can't
get two Normal templates working in two different places. :-)

Yes, the underlying issue is the Programs folder is protected so you need to
use the templates folder in the user profile instead (which is considered a
trusted location so you don't need to modify your macro security in order to
get macros to run). BUT you also need to delete Normal.dot from the Programs
folder or you'll encounter other problems.

Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email cannot be acknowledged.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP

Coauthor of Word 2007 Inside Out:
http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/books/9801.aspx#AboutTheBook

Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/
 
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