When you upgrade an earlier version of Excel, the Excel or Office Installer program gives you the choice of keeping your previous version of Excel or upgrading it. In both cases, your custom toolbars are retained for use with the new version.

If you have multiple Excel versions on your system, or have toolbars you want to use on other systems or share with other users, this article explains how to merge those custom toolbars.

Where Excel stores custom toolbars

Excel stores custom toolbars in a unique location, different from other Office programs.

• Excel 2000   Your toolbar settings are stored in the file Excel.xlb. This file is located in your user profile folder. For the location of this folder, type user profile folder in the Office Assistant or on the Answer Wizard tab in the Excel Help window, and then click Search.

• Previous Windows versions of Excel   Your toolbar settings are stored in the following files and locations:

  Excel Version	File Name	Location
  Excel 97	username8.xlb (username is your login name or the user name you set for Excel).	Windows folder, unless your administrator specifies a different location.
  Excel 95	If user profiles are turned on, username.xlb If user profiles are not turned on, Excel8.xlb	Windows folder
  Excel 5	Excel5.xlb	Windows folder
  Excel 4	Excel.xlb	Windows folder

• Excel for Macintosh®   In Excel 98, the file is named Excel Toolbars (8) and it's located in the System:Preferences folder. For other Excel versions, the file is named Excel Toolbars or Excel Toolbars (5) and is either in the System folder or System:Preferences, depending on your version of the Macintosh operating system.

How the toolbar file is created and updated

When you customize the built-in toolbars or add a custom toolbar, your changes are saved to the toolbar file when you exit Excel. The file contains all your custom toolbars and other changes unless you create separate files. For instructions to create additional toolbar files with different settings, type multiple toolbar configurations in the Office Assistant or on the Answer Wizard tab in the Excel Help window, and then click Search.

When you upgrade a previous version to Excel 2000, if you choose to remove previous versions of Excel, your toolbar files from the previous versions are not removed.

Merging custom toolbars

Follow these steps to use a custom toolbar file from another system or Excel version on your Excel 2000 system.

1. Copy the toolbar file you want to use to your Excel 2000 system.
2. Click Open on the File menu, and open the toolbar file.
3. If your custom toolbar does not appear, point to Toolbars on the View menu, and then select your toolbar.
4. If you opened an Excel 97 toolbar file or an Excel 2000 toolbar file from another system, and you want to save the merged toolbars in the Excel 2000 toolbar file, click Customize on the Tools menu and make at least one change to a merged toolbar (add or remove a button, for example).

   For information about customizing toolbars, type customize toolbars in the Office Assistant or on the Answer Wizard tab in the Excel Help window, and then click Search.

5. To save the merged toolbars in the Excel 2000 toolbar file, click Exit on the File menu. The next time you run Excel 2000, Excel will display the merged toolbars.

If your custom toolbars contain buttons from previous Excel versions that aren't included in Excel 2000, these buttons appear as gray boxes. If you click one of these buttons, the Assign Macro dialog box appears.

If your custom toolbars contain buttons that run macros, you'll also need to copy the macros to any workbooks where you want to use the buttons. For information about copying a macro module to another workbook, type copy a macro in the Office Assistant or on the Answer Wizard tab in the Excel Help window, and then click Search.

More information

The Microsoft Office 2000 Resource Kit includes a profile wizard that lets you back up user settings and restore them to the same or another computer. For information about obtaining the Office Resource Kit, type Office Resource Kit in the Office Assistant or on the Answer Wizard tab in the Excel Help window, and then click Search.