Microsoft KB Archive/64908

Setting Permanent Menu Defaults in Word

PSS ID Number: Q64908 Article last modified on 11-02-1994

4.00 5.00

MS-DOS

= SUMMARY =

Word provides no way of suppressing changes made to default menu items, such as those found in the Options or Print Options menu. This may cause problems for those individuals who must share Word and want to maintain a consistent set of menu options.

There are times, however, when you may want to turn some options on and off during a Word session and not have to worry about resetting them when exiting.

Whenever you make a change to one of Word’s menu items, such as those found in the Options or Print Options menus, Word stores these changes in the MW.INI initialization file when you exit Word. The MW.INI file resides in Word’s working directory. When Word is invoked, it reads the MW.INI file to establish the options in the Word environment.

One method that can be used to set up a default MW.INI file is to first rename the MW.INI file to another name, such as DEFAULT.INI, and then create a batch file that will automatically copy DEFAULT.INI to MW.INI before invoking the actual Word program. By copying a default initialization file on top of the existing one, you can maintain a consistent working environment. Different batch files can be created for each user to copy his or her personal initialization file to MW.INI when invoking the program.

= MORE INFORMATION =

Use the following procedure to create a default MW.INI file:

  In Word, set the options to your preference. Having set the defaults, exit Word to save the changes to the MW.INI file.   At the DOS prompt, change to the directory where Word resides by typing CD  followed by the directory name where the Word program files reside, and then press ENTER. Word version 5.00 probably resides in the WORD5 directory; therefore, type the following and press ENTER: cd   Type the following and press ENTER to create a default .INI file: copy mw.ini default.ini   Start Word by typing “word” (without the quotation marks) and pressing ENTER.   Inside the Word program, type the following lines: cd \word5 copy default.ini mw.ini word   Choose Save from the Transfer menu and enter C:.BAT in the “filename:” field. For Word version 5.00, press the TAB key to move to the “format:” field and press the SPACEBAR to select “Text Only”. If you are using an earlier version of Word, use the TAB key to move to the “formatted:” field and select “No”. Press ENTER and press Y to confirm loss of formatting if requested.   Exit Word. 

Typing “word” from the root directory of the drive will execute the newly created batch file, which will first copy the default .INI file to MW.INI before starting Word. By changing any of the options in Word, Word will save them to the MW.INI file, only to have that file overwritten by the default .INI file the next time the batch file is executed.

If different users require different settings, then create another copy of the MW.INI file, give it a unique name, and create another batch file with a unique name to copy the custom .INI file to MW.INI.

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