I find it good practice to keep a backup of those small configuration-type files that programs will usually build as you use them. Microsoft Office 2007 (and most of it’s previous variants for that matter) support dictionary (.dic) files which contain the custom words you’ve added when you right-click and select Add to Dictionary. If you have done this regularly while using Office, you will have invariably built up a large collection of custom words/names/etc.

This quick tutorial will explain how to best setup your custom dictionary within Office 2007.

1. Click the large Office “sphere” in the top-left corner of any Office app (in Outlook you’ll have to open up a new message window).
2. Click the Editor Options button in the lower-right hand corner of that popup menu.
3. Select Proofing from the list on the left.
4. Click the Custom Dictionaries button about halfway down on the right pane.
5. Here you should see a checkbox list with “CUSTOM.DIC” selected. This is the default .dic file which is located at C:\Documents and Settings\%USERNAME%\Application Data\Microsoft\UProof. What I like to do is copy this file to an alternate location that I backup on the regular (something like My Docs works).
6. Following the copy/paste operation, go back to the Custom Dictionaries window and click Add…. This will open up a browse dialog where you can browse to the copy of your .dic file that should be in My Docs (using the example above). Select that file and click OK.
7. That should return you to the main window with the checkbox selectors. I recommend that you set the new .dic file as the default so that Office will continue to add new words to your new dictionary file. I would also *UN*check the CUSTOM.DIC file, just so unnecessary duplicate files are made, and it only uses your single dictionary file.
8. Finally, click OK

This may have been a more in depth tutorial than it needed to be, but then again, I’m not an expert at writing “tuts” as they call ‘em these days. Hopefully you’ve found this helpful, and leave a quick comment to let me know if so!

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