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Secret 1: Customizing Menus and Toolbars

Do you find yourself using the same menu items over and over or can’t find the button on the toolbar that you need? Secret 1 will help make it easy to customize the interface to the way you work. You can customize menus by adding and deleting commands to your heart’s desire. Likewise, you may customize a toolbar by deleting buttons, adding new buttons, or changing the order of buttons. Heck you can even create your own original toolbar.

Custom Menus
Custom Toolbars
Original Custom Toolbar
Deleting an Original Custom Toolbar
Anchoring & Floating a Toolbar

Customizing Menus

In the first part of this secret, I will show the secret recipe of customizing menus. In this example I will customize the File menu so the Save As Webpage command is directly under the Save command.

Go to Tools > Customize... on the Tools menu.

Figure 1.1

The Customize dialog box will appear. Click the Commands tab. Select Rearrange Commands...

Figure 1.2

In the Rearrange Commands dialog box, select the File menu from the pull down menu. Select the Save As Web Page command and click the Move up button twice until the Save As Web Page command is under the Save command. Repeat the process for any menu item you wish to modify. If you decide you don’t like the change, click Reset to set the menu back to default settings.

When you are finished click Close in the Rearrange dialog box and Customize dialog box.

Figure 1.3

Customizing Toolbars

Go to Tools > Customize… on the Tools menu.

The Customize dialog box will appear. Click the Commands tab.

Select a menu from the Categories area to the left and select a menu command from the right. The cursor will display with a plus sign and gray rectangle. Click and drag the menu command to the toolbar and then release. The Command will automatically become a button on the toolbar.

To delete a button from a toolbar, open the Customize... dialog box and click Rearrange Commands. In the Rearrange Commands dialog box, select the radio button next to Toolbar and then select the Toolbar from the pull down menu you wish to edit. Under Controls, select the command you wish to delete and click the delete button over to the right. You can also use the Move Up and Move Down buttons to change the location of icon on the Toolbar.

Toolbars can be reset to go back to default as well by using the reset button in Rearrange dialog box.

When you are finished click close in the Rearrange dialog box and Customize dialog box.

Creating an Original Custom Toolbar

Now that you are in on the secret to customize menus and toolbars, I will show you how to create a new toolbar with a set of commands you use most.

Go to Tools > Customize... on the Tools menu.

The Customize dialog box will appear. Click the Toolbars tab.

Click New... to create a new toolbar.

In the New Toolbar dialog box under Toolbar name: type the desired name. Click OK.

The new toolbar will appear. Click the Commands tab in the Customize dialog box.

Select a category to find a command. Select the command and click and drag the command over to the new toolbar.

Continue this process until all desired commands have been added to the new toolbar.

When finished, click the Close button in the Customize dialog box. The toolbar will look similar to the one below.

Tip: Command icons can also be added by clicking the down pointed arrow on the toolbar and select add or remove buttons and then customize. This will bring up the Customize dialog box.

Deleting an Original Custom Toolbar

Follow these steps to delete your custom toolbar.

Go to Tools > Customize...

In the Customize dialog box make sure the Toolbars tab is selected.

Select the toolbar you wish to delete.

Click the Delete command button.

Click the OK button & the Close button.

Anchoring & Floating a Toolbar

Some toolbars default to an anchored location; this means the toolbar is a long horizontal strip at the top, bottom, left, or right of the screen.

Some toolbars default to a floating location; this means the toolbar is a rectangular shape located somewhere in the document text window. The header/footer toolbar and the picture toolbar default to a floating location.

Follow these steps to float an anchored toolbar:

Point to the left edge of the toolbar until the pointer becomes a four cornered arrow.

Click and drag the toolbar down to the document area until it becomes a floating toolbar.

Follow these steps to anchor a floating toolbar:

Double-click the title bar of the floating toolbar, and it will return to its last previously anchored location; or

Drag the toolbar to an anchored position at the top, bottom, left or right side of the screen