Re: Easy way to convert templates to documents?

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Hi Peter:

He WON'T be back "soon" :-)

We just discovered a revolting bug that makes this operation very difficult.
Paul will be right with you ... :-)

In the meantime, if you had a copy of WinWord handy, this is trivial in
WinWord. When you double-click on a .dot in WinWord, it creates a document
from the template. You can then save that with the correct name.

If you do have WinWord handy, get back to me: I can give you some bits of
VBA that will do this on Windows.

Otherwise, you will need to wait for Paul's script, which presumably will
have the ability to get all the .dots in a folder one by one, convert them,
and delete the original.

Just as an aside, Mac Word's handling of templates is "wrong" for those of
us accustomed to the PC way of doing things. On the PC, if you double-click
a .dot, regardless of where it is, you get a DOCUMENT created from and
attached to the template. On the Mac, you OPEN the template.

I screamed about this in the beta, because I understood that it would cause
mayhem in a corporate setting. But others new best... {sigh} :-)

On 10/4/05 09:21, in article uishZrVPFHA.2348@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "Peter
Bako" <peter.bako@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Thanks Paul. I knew that just renaming the file to a different extension is
> a bad idea, heck that doesn't even work on a PC much less a Mac. There are
> distinct file format differences between a plain .doc file and a .dot file.
>
> I'm still trying to learn AppleScript, so I am nowhere near to writing a
> script of this caliber, but if you could find one that I can use as a basis,
> that would be great!!!
>
> Peter
>
> "Paul Berkowitz" <berkowit@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
> news:BE7D3507.927D6%berkowit@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> It would not be a good idea AT ALL to change the extension of a .dot
>> template to ".doc". Since the structure of the file is a .dot template.
>> you
>> would be screwing things up so badly that probably nothing much would ever
>> work right again. This is a really,. really bad faux pas you've just
>> recommended, CyberTaz, as I'm sure you'll agree if you think about it for
>> a
>> minute.
>>
>> There probably is a safe way of automating the process of creating
>> documents
>> from the templates, then deleting the templates, by script, but the only
>> safe way of doing it manually is the way Peter has been doing it: move all
>> the .dot files to My Templates, open them all from the Project Gallery,
>> and
>> "Save As" the opened "Document1", etc. with the original document
>> (ex-template) name as Word Document with .doc extension. The tedious part
>> is
>> copying the name from the Finder to paste into the Save As dialog every
>> time. There's no way around that.
>>
>> I can check out a script to see if it will work on a selection of .cot
>> files
>> without having to move them anywhere. Back soon...
>>
>> --
>> Paul Berkowitz
>> MVP MacOffice
>> Entourage FAQ Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/faq/index.html>
>> AppleScripts for Entourage: <http://macscripter.net/scriptbuilders/>
>>
>> Please "Reply To Newsgroup" to reply to this message. Emails will be
>> ignored.
>>
>> PLEASE always state which version of Microsoft Office you are using -
>> **2004**, X or 2001. It's often impossible to answer your questions
>> otherwise.
>>
>>
>>> From: CyberTaz <xyz@xxxxxxx>
>>> Newsgroups: microsoft.public.mac.office.word
>>> Date: Sat, 09 Apr 2005 09:46:40 -0400
>>> Subject: Re: Easy way to convert templates to documents?
>>>
>>> Hi Peter-
>>>
>>> Although this can probably be done with a script I can't tell you how to
>>> go
>>> about automating the process. However, if you go to Finder> Preferences>
>>> Advanced & check the option for Show all file extensions, you can edit
>>> the
>>> filenames in the Finder to .doc to change the file type. Another option
>>> would be to work through the file's Get Info panel to do the same thing.
>>>
>>> HTH |:>)
>>>
>>>
>>> On 4/8/05 9:47 PM, in article elcJXYKPFHA.3928@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx,
>>> "Peter
>>> Bako" wrote:
>>>
>>>> I have a client where about a year ago a user started a document and
>>>> saved
>>>> it as a .dot file. The problem is that she kept the file out in an open
>>>> area that everyone else can get to and people started to use it as a
>>>> template - but not in the Word use of the term. Instead they double
>>>> click
>>>> on it, modify it and then do a File/Save As on it without changing the
>>>> file
>>>> type to a .doc file. Since then this has multiplied into hundreds (if
>>>> not
>>>> thousands) of .dot files across the server being used as if they were
>>>> real
>>>> Word documents.
>>>>
>>>> This occasionally causes weird issues with Word, so I've recommended
>>>> that
>>>> they convert all these into .doc files. Problem is the only way I know
>>>> of
>>>> to do this, is to drag each .dot file into their My Templates folder,
>>>> start
>>>> Word and then create a new document based on this "template". Once the
>>>> document comes up, do an immediate Save As to a doc file, then delete
>>>> the
>>>> original .dot and replace it. As you can imagine this is painful and a
>>>> few
>>>> of my users are having problems even getting this to work.
>>>>
>>>> So, is there any kind of an easy way to convert a large number of .dot
>>>> files
>>>> to .doc files? Or at least an easier way to convert a single .dot to a
>>>> .doc
>>>> that I can have the users do? I've tried to just double click on the
>>>> .dot
>>>> file (which opens up in template edit mode not as a new doc) and then do
>>>> a
>>>> Save As do a .doc file, but you get an error saying you cannot save a
>>>> template as a doc format!
>>>>
>>>> About 90% of the users are running Office V.x but a few are running
>>>> 2004.
>>>>
>>>> Thanks,
>>>> Peter
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>> -- generaltaz1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>>
>>>
>>
>
>

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <john@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 4 1209 1410

.

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