At 06:26 17/11/2008 +0100, John D. Herron wrote:
When you launch OpenOffice.org 3.0, the first thing that appears is a switchboard, i.e. a dialog box with icons that allow the user to open an application or document of his choice. My question: does anyone know whether there is a any way to eliminate (or disable) this chooser? there's nothing about it in the help file.
You get to see this welcome screen only if you choose to start OpenOffice in the manner that generates it. If you want OpenOffice to skip this screen and go to something else, you are asking it to read your mind if you start OpenOffice this way. Use another way instead.
I think there are three ways in which you might want to start OpenOffice, depending on what you want to do with it initially:
o If you want to open an existing document, the simplest way is probably to find and double-click that document. This way, you will see the welcome screen only fleetingly: the document window will then appear.
o If you want to start OpenOffice and to create a blank document of a particular type, there are entry points to allow this. Don't start "OpenOffice.org" (or soffice, or whatever it is called on your platform). Instead, use the entry point that corresponds to the type of blank document you wish to create. Choose "OpenOffice.org Writer" (or swriter), "OpenOffice.org Calc" (or scalc) and so on, as appropriate. You may have menu entries for these, and they are also available from the Quickstarter if you have this running. This way, you will not see the welcome screen.
o There are a few remaining circumstances in which you may want to start OpenOffice without yet declaring what you wish to do next. Perhaps you want to open an existing file, but choose to do so from within OpenOffice. Or perhaps you wish to use a template or to retrieve a document from the Recent Documents list. In these cases, the welcome screen is exactly what you need - so that you can indicate there what you want to do next. And only if you want that screen, I suggest, should you start OpenOffice the way you are currently doing. Note that you do not need to use the options in the centre of the welcome screen, as some menus are alternatively available: File | New >, File | Recent Documents >, and so on may be useful. In particular, the welcome screen doesn't stop you doing anything you could do if it wasn't there!
The welcome screen also appears, of course, if you close all documents without closing the program itself: again, OpenOffice needs to know what you want to do next and the welcome screen is a useful way of displaying this.
If you prefer to have desktop shortcuts or menu entries for the swriter, scalc, etc. entry points, you can create these yourself very simply, of course. (How to do this depends on your platform.)
I trust this helps. Brian Barker --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
