Templates normal and Global??

D

DAVE

I get this message everytime I close a Word Doc..
"The file Normal already exists.Do you want to replace
the existing file" I click "NO" and then the TEMPLATE
WINDOW for Normal template appears to which I click
cancel and a window appears telling me "Changes have been
made to the Global Template. Do you wish to save those
changes and I say "NO" then the Word application will
close. What is happening, what have I done. I have the
latest and greates virus checker Norton and no virus is
detected. I scanned from trends micro thinking my norton
virus has been somehow altered but it detected no virus.
I notice now that when i open Outlook and read my mail
and close,I get "The file Normal already exists. Do you
want to replace it." How do i correct this error and how
was it created. I would greatly appreciate some assitance
as I fear a dreaded loss of my computers data to a virus.
Futher to this is that my IE is now directed to a
homepage I didnot set in Tools, as my home page and it
appears everytime I reboot my machine and open explore it
goes to this "Find it-online" which i have repeatly
cleared and reset set my homepage. Can this be the part
of the problem or is it unrelated. I would like help.
Thanks for any assistance
 
C

Charles Kenyon

First, if it is on, turn off the Office Plug-In in Norton AV.

The message "Changes have been made that affect the global template -
normal. Do you wish to save those changes?" is an important warning. It
means that changes have been made, whether you intended to make changes or
not. You can also get it when your template has been altered by a poorly
written Add-In program or by a malicious virus.

The reason for the message being shown repeatedly is almost always a poorly
written Add-In. The Norton AV Office Plug-In seems to be the most frequent
offender recently, but that can change as some other poorly written program
comes on the market.

Other offenders include the MS Works Suite Add-In, EZ-Photo, Scansoft, Adobe
Acrobat, and Microsoft's MetaData remover. These all install Add-Ins that
mess with your normal.dot when they shouldn't do so and don't need to do so.
Some of these are .dot files, others are installed. See <URL:
http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/Customization/CheckIfAddinsInstalled.htm> for
instructions on seeing what Add-Ins you have. (Having Add-Ins is not a bad
thing. I run Word with 15 Add-Ins, most of which I wrote myself.)

Start with the Add-Ins I've noted. If you have any of them, decide whether
they are worth the annoyance they are causing you. Probably they are not.
Disable any that are not worth the candle. Restart Word and see if your
problem is gone.

If not...

If you start Word using
Start => Run: Winword.exe /a
you'll end up with Word out of the box loading without your saved normal.dot
file, with no macros and no Add-Ins. You may notice that it loads much more
quickly than you are used to seing. When you close it, you won't get the
"normal.dot" prompt.

So, what you need to do is disable all of your Add-Ins (don't delete them).
Start by moving .dot files out of your Word Startup folder, one-by-one, with
Word closed. Restart Word and see if that Add-In caused the problem. If not,
put it back in and take the next one out. (You can put them in a sub-folder
of your Startup folder.) If none of them are the problem, move to the .com
Add-Ins that have to be uninstalled.

If your offender is not on my list, please write back and let us know which
one caused your problems.

Write to the company that put out the Add-In with a complaint, and possibly
a bill for your time.

Hope this helps,
--

Charles Kenyon

Word New User FAQ & Web Directory:
<URL: http://addbalance.com/word/index.htm>

Intermediate User's Guide to Microsoft Word (supplemented version of
Microsoft's Legal Users' Guide)
<URL: http://addbalance.com/usersguide/index.htm>

See also the MVP FAQ: <URL: http://www.mvps.org/word/> which is awesome!
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