Introduction 

This document is intended for anyone who is having their laptop upgraded and finds that some things haven’t transferred with the upgrade, even if you followed the instructions in the Staff Device Program - User Guide | Knowledge Base | CECG ICT Service Desk. This document provides procedures for transferring several features and settings in the Microsoft Office suite that may not have been included in the transfer. 

This document focuses mainly on Word, as this is where you are most likely to have features to transfer. However, the procedure for transferring Word’s Quick Access Toolbar works with only the most minor changes for Excel, PowerPoint and Visio – refer to the section Other Microsoft Office apps. 

Word 

Word Quick Access Toolbar 

Word’s Quick Access Toolbar (QAT) is positioned by default above the ribbon. It’s a place you can add icons for all your favourite commands, styles and macros. The image below shows how mine looks, as it’s currently set up. If you have added any favourites to your QAT in your old laptop, you will need to follow the procedure below to have them appear in the QAT in your new laptop. 

The procedure below also works for another kind of customisation you may have performed in Word if you’re adventurous – creating your own groups of commands on the ribbon.  

Follow this procedure to copy across both your own QAT and any customisations you have made to your ribbon at the same time. 

1.    On your old laptop, open any Word document. 

2.    Select File > Options > Customize Ribbon. 

3.    In the dialog box that opens, click the Import/Export button. 

4.    In the drop-down that opens, select Export all customizations. 

5.    Word displays a Save dialog box in which the File name field is populated with the filename Word Customizations.exportedUI. Browse to any folder on your OneDrive where you can save the file, then press Save.  

6.    Now move to your new laptop, open Word and, as before, select File > Options > Customize Ribbon. Word displays a dialog box like that shown in step 3.  

7.    Click the Import/Export button and this time select Import customization file.  

8.    A File Open dialog box opens. Browse to the same OneDrive folder into which you saved the file Word Customizations.exportedUI. Select that file and click Open.  

9.    A message now warns you that this procedure replaces everything on both your QAT and your ribbon. Click Yes to proceed.  

10.    Your QAT and your ribbon should now look like they did on your old laptop. 

Autocorrect 

Autocorrect entries are of two types: unformatted and formatted. The unformatted ones are stored in files with the extension .acl, while formatted ones are stored in your Normal template (Normal.dotm). Follow the steps below to transfer the unformatted autocorrect entries. If you have any formatted autocorrect entries, you will need to copy your Normal.dotm across too, as described in the section Normal template. 

1.    On your old laptop, press ⊞+R (this means press the Windows key and R together), then in the Run window that opens type %userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft 

2.    In the File Explorer window that opens, double-click on Office.  

3.    In the folder that opens, select all the files listed that have an extension .acl. 

4.    Open any folder in your OneDrive and copy all these .acl files into it. 

5.    Go to your new laptop and open the same OneDrive folder.  

6.    Press ⊞+R, then type %userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft 

7.    In the folder that opens, double-click on Office, then copy the .acl files from the OneDrive folder into the Office folder previously opened. 

Auto text and building blocks 

Auto text is saved by default into the Normal template Normal.dotm but can also be saved in other templates. If you have auto text entries saved in Normal.dotm, use the procedure given in Normal template to transfer the Normal template across. If you have auto text entries saved in other templates that are not in OneDrive, then you will need to transfer those templates to your new laptop or move them into a folder that is inside OneDrive.  

Building blocks are saved in special templates called Building Blocks.dotx and Builtin Building Blocks.dotx, and you will need to copy these to the new laptop. To do this, follows these steps: 

1.    On your old laptop, press ⊞+R, then in the Run window that opens type %userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft 

2.    In the File Explorer window that opens, double-click on Document Building Blocks.  

3.    Next double-click on the folder 1033 and then open the subfolder 16. 

Note. The folder 1033 is language-dependent and represents the language English-US. The folder 16 could be dependent on the version of Word. 

4.    Copy the 2 files Building Blocks.dotx and Builtin Building Blocks.dotx into any folder in your OneDrive.  

5.    Now go to your new laptop and repeat steps 1 to 3 to open the folder labelled 16. If there are already files called Building Blocks.dotx and Builtin Building Blocks.dotx in the folder, rename them in case you need to recover them. 

6.    Go to the folder in your OneDrive into which you copied the files in step 4, and copy those files into the folder 16 just opened. 

Normal template 

If you have many features that haven’t transferred, you will most likely need to copy your Normal template across. To do so, follow these steps:  

1.    On your old laptop, press ⊞+R (this means press the Windows key and R together), then in the Run window that opens type %userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft 

2.    In the File Explorer window that opens, double-click on Templates to open the Templates folder.  

The folder that opens should contain your Normal template, a file called Normal.dotm.  

3.    Open any folder in your OneDrive and copy Normal.dotm into that folder. 

4.    Now go to your new laptop and again press ⊞+R and type %userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft in the Run window.  

5.    In the window that opens, double-click on Templates to open a Templates folder like that shown in step 2. If there is already a file named Normal.dotm in the folder, make a copy and save it under another name, as you will be overwriting the original file, and you may need to recover the original if there is an error. 

6.    Open the OneDrive folder into which you copied Normal.dotm and copy Normal.dotm into the Templates folder. If a message asks you if you wish to overwrite a file already there, click the OK or Yes button. 

7.    Any future documents will now be based on the Normal.dotm file you have just transferred, and any features or settings should now be available on the new laptop. 

Other Microsoft Office apps 

Quick Access Toolbars 

The procedure for transferring the Word QAT (Word Quick Access Toolbar) works almost identically for Excel, PowerPoint and Visio if you replace ‘Word’ everywhere in the procedure with ‘Excel’, ‘PowerPoint’ or ‘Visio’, as appropriate. The name of file used for the export in step 5 of that procedure will have been assigned accordingly too: namely to either Excel Customizations.exportedUI, PowerPoint Customizations.exportedUI or Visio Customizations.exportedUI (instead of Word Customizations.exportedUI).