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General discussion

Initiating MS Office 2003 tool bar

Aug 27, 2004 3:46AM PDT

For years MS has dutifully added the tool bar to our desktops. However no toolbar is present in 2003 with Win XP Pro. Anyone else having this issue? Any ideas for a fix or workaround?

Discussion is locked

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Re: MS Office 2003 tool bar
Aug 27, 2004 4:06AM PDT

You're not the only one to note so. It just disappeared. By design, Microsoft might say. See http://office.microsoft.com/assistance/preview.aspx?AssetID=HP010716391033&CTT=4&Origin=CH010344561033

Apart from the alternatives offered there (add links to the WinXP Startmenu or the Quick Launch Area) you can also put any shortcut you want on the Desktop or create your own desktop toolbar and fill it with shortcuts to whatever part of Office you want. But you will have to do it yourself, as Microsoft won't offer it pre-packed.

Hope this helps.

Kees

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Re: MS Office 2003 tool bar
Sep 2, 2004 1:57AM PDT

Many thanks for the link! I left a rather thoughtful note on the MS "Were we helpful" system concerning a lack of concern for user habits and sloppy programatic follow through in rolling out office 2003.

I wonder if the 2000 toolbar program component can be tweeked to run on 2003? I did this with dosshell on the Win 95 and 98 platforms in order to provide a back door tool for looking at malicious software and deleting hard to remove viruses. Unfortunately, dosshell is incompatible with XP Pro;-(

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I'd love to read the item.
Apr 19, 2005 10:58PM PDT

I tried your link to the appropriate web page, but I got the following message
'This Web page is unavailable'

Sad

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Re: Initiating MS Office 2003 tool bar
Aug 27, 2004 7:16AM PDT

While I don't have Office 2003, you might try the command line that worked with my Office 2002:

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office10\OSA.EXE" -b -l

If that works (or you might have to adjust the path to wherever your "OSA.EXE" file is located) then you might have to answer a question as to whether of not you want the Office Bar to startup at every time you logon.

If the command does work, but you don't see such a question, then you could make your own shortcut item and place it in your:
"C:\Documents and Settings\<username> \Start Menu\Programs\Startup\" folder.

Good luck.

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MS Office toolbar for Office 2003
Apr 19, 2005 10:48PM PDT

If you still have your old MS Office 2000 CDs (and a reasonable amount of space on your hard drive), just do a CUSTOM reinstallation of the LEAST number of Office 2000 components and choose to run it from the hard drive, not the CD --- if you choose to run the toolbar from the CD, you won't have it the next time you turn on your PC (unless you want to keep the Office 2000 CD in the drive all the time). Presto! The little darling is back; just like old times!!!

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Office toolbar
Apr 20, 2005 6:56AM PDT

Well, I for one, at first thought I couldn't live without the Office Toolbar, but found I was wrong. Its just a matter of changing habits and procedures. I now have a shortcut for all the Office Programs, as well as icons for other frequently used progams, on the taskbar. They take up very little space just to the right of the START button and I am now convinced that is the only place for them. The Taskbar, if your monitor is big enough can be expanded to have room for more than one line of info. For example, off in the right corner I have the time, spelled out day of the week, and the calendar date. All in three lines. Its surprising how often all that info is needed at a glance. With the taskbar expanded, there is also lots of room for many open windows from the internet if you happen to have several sites open at once. So, for me, I like the new way and am glad Microsoft did it. The old toolbar always seemed to get lost and disapear and then there would be the hassle of remembering how to get it going again and so on. Much easier this way. At least that's my opinion of the day.

Rogge