Customizing Toolbars

Each Office application includes an assortment of toolbars in addition to the Standard and Formatting toolbars. Some, such as Word's Outlining toolbar and Excel's PivotTable toolbar, appear automatically when you begin performing specific tasks. You can show specific toolbars and arrange them onscreen when they're needed and then hide them when you're finished working with them. In every Office application, you can also customize toolbars by adding and removing buttons, and you can create new custom toolbars that contain exactly the buttons and menu choices you specify.

Showing, Hiding, and Arranging Toolbars

To display or hide toolbars, right-click any visible toolbar or right-click the menu bar to see a list of commonly available toolbars, similar to the one in Figure 2.2. Click any item in the list to display that toolbar; click a checked item to hide the toolbar.

Curiously, not all available toolbars are shown on this pop-up list. If you work with a Word document in Normal view, for example, you'll see a selection of only 19 toolbars on this list, although 30 are actually available. To make any of these additional toolbars available, select Tools, Customize, and click the Toolbars tab (see Figure 2.3). Check the box next to any item on the list to make that toolbar visible.

When working with toolbars, you have three positioning options:

• You can dock any toolbar to any side of the screen. By default, for example, the Standard and Formatting toolbars are docked just below the menu bar in every application, and the Drawing toolbar attaches itself to the bottom of the screen. Click the sizing handle (the thin horizontal bar at the left or top edge of a docked toolbar) and drag the toolbar to any edge of the screen to snap it into its new position.

• You can dock two or more toolbars on the same edge, side by side, or one over the other. Drag the sizing handle to move a toolbar on its row.

• You can also drag any docked toolbar into the application window to let it "float." This option is best suited for controls you use when designing forms and charts, creating macros, working with objects in the drawing layer, and editing PivotTables. In fact, Excel's PivotTable Field List toolbar does not allow you to dock it to the bottom of the screen because doing so would render it practically useless.

When you add more buttons to a toolbar than will fit in the current screen width, or when you dock two or more toolbars on the same row, there might not be enough room to display all buttons. In that case, the application shows only those buttons you have used most recently; click the down arrow at the right of the toolbar to see additional choices.

If you regularly use specific sets of toolbars, create macros that display and position the toolbars you want, and then clear them away as needed. Assign the macros to menus or buttons on the Standard toolbar for quick access.

Use the following code, for example, to show the Web and Drawing toolbars, with the Web toolbar floating and the Drawing toolbar docked to the bottom of the screen. The .Left and .Top properties define the starting point, in pixels, from the left edge and top edge for a floating toolbar:

Sub ShowFavoriteToolbars()
    With CommandBars("Web")
        .Visible = True
        .Position = msoBarFloating
        .Left = 300
        .Top = 400
    End With
    With CommandBars("Drawing")
        .Visible = True
        .Position = msoBarBottom
    End With
End Sub
						

To hide all toolbars except the Standard and Formatting, use the following code:

Sub HideAllToolbars()
On Error Resume Next
For Each cmdbar In CommandBars
    If cmdbar.Name = "Standard" Or cmdbar.Name = "Formatting" Then
        cmdbar.Visible = True
    Else
        cmdbar.Visible = False
    End If
Next
On Error Goto 0
End Sub

→ For a thorough introduction to the art and science of macros and VBA code, see "How Macros Work".

Adding and Removing Buttons

Instead of using personalized menus and toolbars, most expert users prefer to customize built-in toolbars, adding and grouping buttons they use most often. Click the Toolbar Options arrow at the right side of any toolbar and select Add or Remove Buttons to display the list of buttons available for that toolbar, as in Figure 2.4 (if you add a button, it appears on this list as well). A check mark next to any item on the list means that button is currently visible; click to toggle this check mark and display or hide the button.

When customizing the selection of buttons on a toolbar, you're not limited to choices on the Add or Remove Buttons menu. In any Office application, you can add any command, macro, or existing menu to a toolbar. In Word, you can add fonts, styles, and AutoText entries as well. Access users can also select from tables, queries, forms, and reports in the current database, plus Web pages and ActiveX controls.

To add a command to a toolbar, follow these steps:

If you never use certain toolbar buttons, clear them away to make room for the buttons you do use. It's ridiculously easy to remove a button from a toolbar: Point to the button you want to remove, and then hold down the Alt key as you drag it off the toolbar—when the pointer displays a tool icon with an X, release the mouse button to delete the item. If the Customize dialog box is open, you can remove any button or menu item by dragging it off the menu bar.