I was experiencing problems with my normal.dot and so I closed word, renamed
the file as document.dot in windows explorer, but when I reopened word, it
appears as though it created a new template (because the formatting is
different that it had been), but it does not seem as though word created a
new normal.dot. The only dot I can find is the one I re-named document.dot.
Any suggestions?

I seem to recall reading somewhere (can't find it at the moment though)
that this is how normal.dot works in Word 2003. Word 2003 does not
explicitly create a normal.dot file in the user templates folder until
you do something to change one of the defaults in normal.dot. In the
meantime, Word 2003 uses its built-in (hardcoded) version of normal.dot.

MAS wrote:

I was experiencing problems with my normal.dot and so I closed word, renamed
the file as document.dot in windows explorer, but when I reopened word, it
appears as though it created a new template (because the formatting is
different that it had been), but it does not seem as though word created a
new normal.dot. The only dot I can find is the one I re-named document.dot.
Any suggestions?

Thank you. I thought I was hallucinating when I could not find normal.dot
for my Word 2003, hidden or otherwise. Thanks so much.

Joepd

"garfield-n-odie" wrote:

I seem to recall reading somewhere (can't find it at the moment though)
that this is how normal.dot works in Word 2003. Word 2003 does not
explicitly create a normal.dot file in the user templates folder until
you do something to change one of the defaults in normal.dot. In the
meantime, Word 2003 uses its built-in (hardcoded) version of normal.dot.

MAS wrote:

I was experiencing problems with my normal.dot and so I closed word, renamed
the file as document.dot in windows explorer, but when I reopened word, it
appears as though it created a new template (because the formatting is
different that it had been), but it does not seem as though word created a
new normal.dot. The only dot I can find is the one I re-named document.dot.
Any suggestions?