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How to customize the My Places bar in both the Open and the Save As dialog boxes in Office

Article ID: 826214

Article Last Modified on 6/18/2007

APPLIES TO

Microsoft Office Access 2003
Microsoft Office Excel 2003
Microsoft Office FrontPage 2003
Microsoft Office Publisher 2003
Microsoft Office Word 2003
Microsoft Access 2002 Standard Edition
Microsoft Excel 2002 Standard Edition
Microsoft FrontPage 2002 Standard Edition
Microsoft Publisher 2002 Standard Edition
Microsoft Word 2002 Standard Edition
Microsoft Office Visio Professional 2007
Microsoft Office Visio Standard 2007
Microsoft Office Publisher 2007
Microsoft Office Project Professional 2007
Microsoft Office Project Standard 2007
Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007
Microsoft Office Outlook 2007
Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 with Business Contact Manager
Microsoft Office OneNote 2007
Microsoft Office Excel 2007

Important This article contains information about how to modify the registry. Make sure that you back up the registry before you modify it. Make sure that you know how to restore the registry if a problem occurs. For more information about how to back up, restore, and modify the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

256986 Description of the Microsoft Windows registry

This article is a consolidation of the following previously available article: 282087

SUMMARY

This article describes how to customize the My Places bar in Microsoft Office. The My Places bar appears in the left pane of both the Open and the Save As dialog boxes in Microsoft Office programs.

The following customizations are available for the My Places bar.

How to add items to the My Places bar

To add an item to the My Places bar in Office 2002 or in Office 2003, follow these steps:

On the File menu in any Office program, click Open.
In the Open dialog box, select the item that you want to add in the contents pane. For example, in the Look in list, click My Documents. On the Contents pane, click My Pictures.
Click Tools, and then click Add to "My Places".

To add an item to the My Places bar in Office 2007, follow these steps:

In any 2007 Office program, click the Microsoft Office Button, and then click Open.
In the Open dialog box, click the drive, the folder, or the Internet location for which you want to create a My Places bar shortcut.
Right-click a blank space in the My Places bar below the existing shortcuts, and then click Add folder name. Your new shortcut appears at the bottom of the My Places bar.

Note You can add up to 256 items to the My Places bar.

How to remove items from the My Places bar

To remove an item from the My Places bar in Office 2002 or in Office 2003, follow these steps:

On the File menu in any Office program, click Open.
On the My Places bar, right-click the item that you want to remove, and then click Remove.

To remove an item from the My Places bar in Office 2007, follow these steps:

In any 2007 Office program, click the Microsoft Office Button, and then click Open.
In the Open dialog box, right-click the item that you want to remove, and then click Remove.

Note The following default items that appear on the My Places bar cannot be removed or renamed.

Office 2003 and Office 2007

My Recent Documents
Desktop
My Documents
My Computer
My Network Places

Office 2002

History
My Documents
Desktop
Favorites
My Network Places

These items can be hidden from the My Places bar. For an example of how to hide a Standard place, see the "Registry Entry Reference" section.

How to rename items on the My Places bar

To rename an item on the My Places bar in Office 2002 or in Office 2003, follow these steps:

On the File menu in any Office program, click Open.
On the My Places bar, right-click the item that you want, and then click Rename.
In the Rename Place dialog box, type the name that you want, and then click OK.

To rename an item on the My Places bar in Office 2007, follow these steps:

In any 2007 Office program, click the Microsoft Office Button, and then click Open.
On the My Places bar, right-click the item that you want, and then click Rename.
In the Rename dialog box, type the name that you want, and then click OK.

How to rearrange items on the My Places bar

To rearrange items on the My Places bar in Office 2002 or in Office 2003, follow these steps:

On the File menu in any Office program, click Open.
On the My Places bar, right-click the item that you want to move, and then click Move Up or Move Down.

To rearrange items on the My Places bar in Office 2007, follow these steps:

In any 2007 Office program, click the Microsoft Office Button, and then click Open.
On the My Places bar, right-click the item that you want to move, and then click Move Up or click Move Down.

How to change the size of icons on the My Places bar

To change the size of an icon for an item on the My Places bar in Office 2002 or in Office 2003, follow these steps:

On the File menu in any Office program, click Open.
Right-click a blank area of the My Places bar, and then click Small Icons or Large Icons.

To change the size of an icon for an item on the My Places bar in Office 2007, follow these steps:

In any 2007 Office program, click the Microsoft Office Button, and then click Open.
Right-click a blank area of the My Places bar, and then click Small Icons or click Large Icons.

How to edit the registry to hide desktop items

Warning Serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly by using Registry Editor or by using another method. These problems might require that you reinstall the operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that these problems can be solved. Modify the registry at your own risk.

You can hide default icons on the My Places bar by modifying the system registry.

Note At least one icon must always appears on the My Places bar. If you try to remove all the default icons on the My Places bar, the Desktop icon will remain. If you add one custom icon, you will see that custom icon instead of the Desktop icon. To hide the Desktop item on the My Places bar, follow these steps:

Quit all Office programs.
Click Start, click Run, type regedit the Open box, and then click OK.
Expand the following subkey.

Office 2007

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Common\Open Find\Places\StandardPlaces

Office 2003

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Common\Open Find\Places\StandardPlaces

Office XP

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\Common\Open Find\Places\StandardPlaces
On the File menu, click Export.
In the Export Registry File dialog box, type Export to Office in the File name box, and then click Save.
Click Desktop.
On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value.
In the New Value#1 box, type Show, and then press ENTER.
Right-click Show, and then click Modify.
In the Edit DWORD Value dialog box, type 0 in the Value data box, and then click OK.
Quit Registry Editor.

Registry entry reference

Entries on the My Places bar are contained in the following registry key.

Office 2007

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Common\Open Find\Places

Office 2003

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Common\Open Find\Places

Office XP

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\Common\Open Find\Places

The Places key contains the following two subkeys:

StandardPlaces
UserDefinedPlaces

The StandardPlaces Subkey

This subkey contains the following five keys that correspond to the five default items that appear on the My Places bar:

KEY NAME	MY PLACES ITEM
Desktop	Desktop
MyComputer	MyComputer
MyDocuments	My Documents
Publishing	My Network Places
Recent	History

The UserDefinedPlaces Subkey

This subkey contains keys that correspond to items that are added to the My Places bar. The keys in the following table are examples of keys that are in the UserDefinedPlaces subkey:

KEY NAME	MY PLACES ITEM
Place0	firstplaceadded
Place1	secondplaceadded
Place2	thirdplaceadded

The following values can be used for keys that are contained in both the StandardPlaces and the UserDefinedPlaces keys:

NAME	TYPE	DATA OPTIONS
View	DWORD	{1=List, 2=Details, 3=Summary, 4=Preview}
ArrangeBy	DWORD	{1=Name, 2=Type, 3=Size, 4=Date}
SortAscending	DWORD	Boolean to sort both ascending and descending.
Index	DWORD	Relative position on the My Places bar.
Show	DWORD	Zero to hide a Standard place.

Additional query words: OfficeKBHowTo inf WD2003 VSO2007 PRJ2007 PUB2007 PPT2007 OneNote2007 OL2007 XL2007

Keywords: kbhowtomaster KB826214

Microsoft KB Archive/826214