Standardizing Micro$oft Word templates-

May 9, 2006 11:23 PM

I need to have everyone 'on the same page' so to speak.

I am helping a friend at their office and they have exceeded their budget for proper IT support so they called me. What they need is for everybody to be using the same stationary, email signatures etc. So when they make a new Word document, it comes up with the stationery I made. Or when they go into Outlook it already has the right format and disclaimer etc. They have SBS 2003 and I was wondering if there was an easy way to do this other than going into everyone's PC and manually screwing with their Application Data. Most workstations here have multiple logons and users as they are about 3 PCs short. Also bonus points if you can tell me how to make the templates uneditable.

posted by Bdave to computers & internet (3 comments total)

I'm assuming these machines are networked.

For Word, I'd make a folder full of .dot templates on one of the machines (or on the central file server if there is one).

I'd set the NTFS permissions on the folder so that only the person in charge of creating templates is allowed to modify files in it, but everyone can read it.

Then I'd share the folder on the network (using Full Control for Everyone permissions on the share, because I prefer to rely solely on NTFS permissions for access control) and add a shortcut to that share to everybody's desktop.

Then I'd tell everybody that the right way to create a new Word document is to click into that desktop shortcut and double-click the appropriate template.

For Outlook, I have no idea. I tend to run screaming when anybody says "Outlook" in my presence.
posted by flabdablet at 2:16 AM on May 10, 2006

The Group Policy Management Console is your friend. Learn GP's in SBS 2k3 and you'll have a great advantage in accomplishing your goal.
You don't say what version of Office they're using, but for Office 2k3 there are a set of group policy templates that can be used to customize some areas of Office from within GP's. This is a start, but only a start, on getting everyone on the same page.
For Word templates: To expand on flabdablets solution a bit further, go into Word's Tools/Options area and set the file location for Templates to the shared folder. When users create new documents, the templates will be sourced from there.
Outlook signatures are difficult. They are implemented differently based on a couple of factors - the version of Outlook, the format of the email, etc.
They are stored, as you pointed out, in your application data folder: "C:\Documents and Settings\User\Application Data\Microsoft\Signatures" or similar. When you create a signature using Outlook's Signature tool, it creates three versions, .txt, .rtf, and .htm versions.
You can create standard versions of these (put them in that template directory you created on the shared drive), and copy them using group policy or a logon script to the appropriate folder.
The stupid thing? You have to go into Outlook and tell it what signature to use. That's best done with an email to your users with something like "Open Tools/Options, select the Mail Format tab, then choose "signature1" and "signature2" for your new and reply to signatures".

Google "Outlook for Multiple or Roaming Users" and you'll get a pile of other resources as well (but most have more to do with installation than post-install configuration).
posted by disclaimer at 4:47 AM on May 10, 2006

The toolset for doing this is to create appropriate Workgroup Policies on the SBS server, such that when domain users log in, their default template folder location is overridden to the networked shared location, secured essentially as flabdablet has suggested. Generally, you can use free tools supplied in the MS Office Resource Kit for the (latest) version of Office you run. You can do similar things on the SBS server to manage Outlook conformity, assuming you are running SBS as an IMAP server for mail. Running SBS as a POP3 server makes no sense for your operation where more than one person uses a computer.
posted by paulsc at 4:51 AM on May 10, 2006