Word 2007 Tip of the Day: Re-Enable Your AddIn

Sometimes Word will disable AddIns. You'll be looking for a Custom Task Pane you've installed, or maybe some Ribbon customization, and the AddIn will seem to have just disappeared. Why does Word do this? Oh, it could be one of many reasons: You may install an AddIn that has the same namespace as another you've already installed, or maybe you monkeyed with the XML in a .docx and Word choked on your edits when it tried to open the document. For whatever reason, when Word experiences a conflict with AddIns or XML within documents, it will disable AddIns and focus on recovering the document.

You don't have to re-install the AddIn. Just go re-enable it.

Tip #3: Re-Enable your AddIn

1) Goto The Button


2)Click Word Options


3)Select AddIns in the left Pane of the "Word Options" dialog.


4) Select COM Add-ins in the dropdown next to "Manage" at the bottom of the "Word Options" dialog, and click "Go...".


5)Check the checkbox next to the AddIn you want to enable and then click "OK".


Most of the time, this re-enables our AddIn successfully until the next time we hammer Word with an AddIn or document it doesn't like.

If the AddIn fails to enable, Word may provide a reason as to why it can't re-enable the AddIn. This may, or may not, be helpful. Or, the AddIn may just fail silently and fail to enable. Most of the time I'm able to re-enable an AddIn without issue, but there's something else we can do to help us identify issues when enabling AddIns. That's a tip for tomorrow though.