I'm not really expecting any answers here, this is just an observation for now but don't be shy to comment!
Here at work we have a set of PCs running Office 2010 that all point to the same copy of normal.dotm. That file is set to read-only (using Explorer).
Yesterday a user reported that "the button on the ribbon isn't working". Turns out that this was because the central copy of normal.dotm had been over written by a vanilla normal.dotm by another user's PC. The fix was quick, replace the dud normal.dotm with a backup copy of the real thing.
What I don't understand though is how the nominally read-only copy of normal.dotm got blitzed. I'm going to keep an eye on the read-only attribute of normal.dotm but I suspect the problem will hide until I stop checking said attribute...
Ken
Word over-writing a read-only normal.dotm
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HansV
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Re: Word over-writing a read-only normal.dotm
Strange. I made my Normal.dotm read-only temporarily, then modified a style and indicated that it should be used in "new documents based on this template" (i.e. Normal.dotm).
When I closed Word, I got a Save As dialog to save Normal.dotm under another name. When I tried to overwrite the existing version, it wasn't allowed:
So it doesn't seem possible to overwrite a read-only Normal.dotm from within Word. You can do it in Windows Explorer, of course.
(Environment: Word 2010 SP2 on Windows 7 Enterprise)
When I closed Word, I got a Save As dialog to save Normal.dotm under another name. When I tried to overwrite the existing version, it wasn't allowed:
So it doesn't seem possible to overwrite a read-only Normal.dotm from within Word. You can do it in Windows Explorer, of course.
(Environment: Word 2010 SP2 on Windows 7 Enterprise)
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Best wishes,
Hans
Hans
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Re: Word over-writing a read-only normal.dotm
Yes, strange because what you've just found is how I'd expect it to behave and as a far as I'm aware is always has behaved.
Yet yesterday normal.dotm was not read-only and it didn't contain the macros to which the buttons on the Ribbon point. I know by using Explorer who the 'owner' of the dud normal.dotm was and they are not the sort of user who would know how to find where the central copy of normal.dotm lives, let alone know how to use Explorer to remove the RO attribute. Their PC must have done it silently but I can't see how it could have done that
All I can think is that the previous version of normal.dotm, the one that got wiped, was not set to RO. Why/how I've no idea, the back-up copy in my master copy repository that I deployed was already set to RO.
All I can do is keep eye on the file but I bet all will be well until I stop checking. It the way gremlins work isn't it?
Ken
Yet yesterday normal.dotm was not read-only and it didn't contain the macros to which the buttons on the Ribbon point. I know by using Explorer who the 'owner' of the dud normal.dotm was and they are not the sort of user who would know how to find where the central copy of normal.dotm lives, let alone know how to use Explorer to remove the RO attribute. Their PC must have done it silently but I can't see how it could have done that
All I can think is that the previous version of normal.dotm, the one that got wiped, was not set to RO. Why/how I've no idea, the back-up copy in my master copy repository that I deployed was already set to RO.
All I can do is keep eye on the file but I bet all will be well until I stop checking. It the way gremlins work isn't it?
Ken