Dear Stephanie Krieger:

I am trying to read the XML links when I have the time. However, I am really busy trying to learn the other applications as well as VBA, VB 2005, and PL/SQL. Ha, you think that you are waist deep in alligators? Well, me too!
I have read Beth Melton's beautiful article. But what if I have fifty documents on my computer and I need to change the header or logo on all of them? What can I do in XML that will change all fifty documents at once? Beth Melton's wonderful article explained the situation for one document only.

I am thanking you and Beth Melton for your articles!

Hi, Wilfred,

I volunteer my time whenever I can to help people with questions on software they're learning. But,I am not here to do the work for others so that they don't have to learn. That doesn't help anyone.

There are no shortcuts of the sort you're requesting. To programmatically create and edit Office XML documents, you need to learn at least the basics of Office XML. I've given you several free resources to help you do this.

Once you begin writing your code - if you run into specific stumbling blocks or have questions about it, I will be happy to help if I can.

Best,
Stephanie

One small question: I use the Work menu in Word extensively to track frequently used documents. As the listings there do not vanish, that is, they are not replaced by more recently used documents, it is an easy way to access frequently used files. Will this be in Word 2007? There are other ways to access frequently used documents, such as creating macros to load them, but this is the most convenient (at leaast, for me).

thanks

Hi, Dave,

Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007 have a cool new feature that should work for you - you can pin files to the recently used list. If you already have access to the beta - notice an icon that looks like a pin beside any file names on the recently used list. When you click that icon it turns green - then the item will remain on that list as long as you need it - until you click again to turn off the pin.

Best,
Stephanie

Hi Stephanie:

I've been teaching/developing MS Word for 10 years now and the new Office 2007 UI is really throwing me for a loop, especially the style area. Would you consider doing a Webinar on styling documents in 2007?

Thanks!
Stacy

Hi, Stacy,

I apologize for the delay in responding to your comment ... it slipped past me somehow :)

I will be giving several webcasts on the 2007 Office release in September and October. Styles will be touched on in my September sessions, and covered quite a bit in my first October session - which will be a deep dive into Word. Check back here for dates and registration links -- or keep an eye on www.microsoft.com/greattips - which lists webcasts for the current month. The September sessions are already available there for registration.

... meanwhile ... though you have new options with the Quick Style Gallery and Quick Style Sets -- and some great new features for styles that, as a trainer and developer, you'll love when you get to know them ... paragraph and character styles can still work very much like they always have. (Press CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+S to open the Styles pane or CTRL+SHIFT+S to open the Apply Styles pane, and you'll probably feel more at home immediately. Also, click the Manage Styles button at the bottom of the Styles pane for a new dialog box (with lots of cool new features) that incorporates the features of the old Style dialog box on its Edit tab). Table and list styles are also still very much the same - just differently accessed ... click the Multilevel LIst gallery in the Paragraph group on the Home tab for an option to define a new List Style ... and when you click in a table, you'll get the Table Tools contextual tabs - find table styles on the Table Tools Design tab.

If you get stumped with specific questions or run into a wall that keeps you from investigating further - post a question to the most recent post here on my blog anytime, and I'll be happy to answer -

Best,
Stephanie