How to manage the Office 2003 templates in Office 2003 programs (889495)


The information in this article applies to:

  • Microsoft Office Professional Edition 2003
  • Microsoft Office Access 2003
  • Microsoft Office Excel 2003
  • Microsoft Office FrontPage 2003
  • Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2003
  • Microsoft Office Publisher 2003
  • Microsoft Office Word 2003
  • Microsoft Office Outlook 2003
  • Microsoft Office Standard Edition 2003
  • Microsoft Office Student and Teachers Edition 2003
  • Microsoft Office Small Business Edition 2003
  • Microsoft Office Basic Edition 2003
For a Microsoft Office XP version of this article, see 290232.
Important This article contains information about modifying the registry. Before you modify the registry, make sure to back it up and make sure that you understand how to restore the registry if a problem occurs. For information about how to back up, restore, and edit the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

256986 Description of the Microsoft Windows Registry

INTRODUCTION

This article describes the following Microsoft Office 2003 issues:
  • The location of templates that are in Office 2003.
  • How the Templates dialog box displays the available templates.
  • The registry settings that control where to find your custom templates.

MORE INFORMATION

Office 2003 saves all the new custom template files that you create in any Office 2003 program in one location.

There are four template categories in Office 2003. When you click On my computer in the New task pane, the Office 2003 program that you are using looks in the following locations for the templates that belong to that program:
  • The User templates file location
  • The Workgroup templates file location
  • The Advertised and Installed templates file location
  • The non-file-based templates files location

The User templates file location

Newly created or newly modified templates are saved in a folder in your profile directory. The folders that are under your profile contain your configuration preferences and options. Everything that has to roam with you is stored in these directories as part of your profile.

By default, User templates files are stored in the following location:

C:\Documents and Settings\user name\Application Data\Microsoft\Templates

Note You can change the location of User templates files.

How to change the template location

You can use Microsoft Office Word 2003 to change the location where your new templates are saved. To do this, follow these steps.

Note If you use Word 2003 to change the location where your new templates are saved, you will also change the location where all Office 2003 program templates are saved.
  1. Start Word 2003.
  2. On the Tools menu, click Options.
  3. On the File Locations tab, click User templates, and then click Modify.
  4. In the Modify Location dialog box, change the setting in the Folder name or the Look in list to the folder where you want to save your new templates, and then click OK.
  5. Click OK or Close to close the Options dialog box.
The changed path is noted in the Windows registry, and it is used the next time that you want to save a new template. For more information, see the "Changes in the Windows Registry settings for the User templates file location and for the Workgroup templates file location" section.

Note A network administrator can change the location where your new templates are saved by using the policy templates that are included with the Microsoft Office 2003 Resource Kit. For more information, contact your network administrator.

You can also create custom tabs that appear in the Templates dialog box by creating a new folder within the Templates folder in your profile. Tabs with the same name as your new folder appear in the Templates dialog box. These tabs let you categorize your new templates even more.

To view the Templates dialog box, use one of the following methods depending on the Office 2003 program that you are using:
  • In Microsoft Office Access 2003, click New on the File menu, and then click On my computer in the New File task pane.
  • In Microsoft Office Excel 2003, click New on the File menu, and then click On my computer in the New Workbook task pane.
  • In Microsoft Office FrontPage 2003, click New on the File menu, and then click More page templates or More Web site templates.
  • In Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2003, click New on the File menu, and then click On my computer in the New Presentation task pane.
  • In Microsoft Office Publisher 2003, click New on the File menu, and then click Templates on the New Publication task pane.

    Note There is no Templates dialog box in Publisher 2003. Instead, your new custom template folder will appear under Templates on the New Publication task pane.
  • In Word 2003, click New on the File menu, and then click On my computer on the New Document task pane.

Workgroup templates file location

The templates that are saved in this location are basically the same as the templates that are saved in your User templates file location, except that the location is typically a shared folder on a network drive. By default, the Workgroup templates file location is not set to a specific folder and is blank.

Note Your network administrator may set a shared location as a source from which to provide templates that are used throughout your workgroup or company. The Workgroup template file location typically is a read-only shared network folder.

Besides looking in your default User templates file location for existing templates, Office 2003 programs look in the Workgroup templates file location for additional templates that may exist.

For more information about the Workgroup templates file location and about how to share a template with your workgroup or your company, contact your network administrator.

Advertised and Installed templates file location

Advertised templates are the templates that are included with Office 2003. These templates appear in the Templates dialog box. Depending on the type of installation, you may not have all the templates installed on your computer. However, in the Templates dialog box, each Office 2003 program displays the templates as they are available.

When you select a template, the Office 2003 program determines whether the template is installed. If the template is installed, a new document that is based on the template opens. If the template is advertised but not installed, you receive a message from the program to install the template.

You can remove installed templates by starting the Office 2003 installation program and then by setting the template group to Installed on First Use. This effectively removes the templates from the computer, and they again become advertised templates. By default, all Microsoft Office installed templates are installed to the following folder:

C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Templates\Language ID Number

Note The language ID number is a four-digit code representing the language types currently installed. For example, the English (US) version of Office 2003 installs a "1033" folder, the Arabic version installs a "1025" folder, and the German version installs a "1031" folder. Office 2003 supports many other languages, and you can have multiple languages installed at the same time. Therefore, you may have a Templates folder that contains several of these language ID folders.

Non-file-based templates

Office 2003 programs use non-file-based templates to create new workbooks, documents, databases, and slides. As the name suggests, there is no physical template from that these special files are created from. Each Office 2003 program has the necessary information to create a new file of the correct type.

For example, if the global template (Normal.dot) that Microsoft Word uses to create a blank document, Word uses its internally stored settings to create a new blank document.

Changes in the Windows Registry settings for the User templates file location and for the Workgroup templates file location

Warning If you use Registry Editor incorrectly, you may cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that you can solve problems that result from using Registry Editor incorrectly. Use Registry Editor at your own risk.
Office 2003 uses two registry keys to record the User templates file location and the Workgroup templates file location. Both of these settings are recorded in the following registry key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Common\General

The user templates location is stored in the UserTemplates string value.

The workgroup templates location is stored in the SharedTemplates string value.

These string values do not exist until you make a change to the default locations for your custom templates. By default, all Office 2003 programs look for their installed templates. Therefore, no string value is required for the location of Office 2003 programs.

If you change the user templates location back to the default location as described in the "User templates file location" section, the UserTemplates string value is deleted from the registry. However, if you change the workgroup templates location back to its default, the SharedTemplates string value is retained in the registry.
Modification Type:MinorLast Reviewed:2/10/2006
Keywords:kbtemplate kbhowto KB889495 kbAudEndUser
©2004 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.