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If you used Word back in the old days, you may or may not have known that you could customize the toolbars, or even create your own. Few people did. That may change with the new Ribbon interface. Despite the Ribbon's quicker nature than the toolbars of old, you may find yourself pining for certain commands that used to be immediately available on a toolbar and are now buried somewhere within the Ribbon.
To satisfy your customization desperation, Word comes with the Quick Access toolbar, which can be customized to your heart's content.
Finding the toolbar
The Quick Access toolbar is preset to dwell above the Ribbon, just to the right of the Office Button, shown in Figure 1. Three command buttons reside on the toolbar: Save, Undo, and Redo. Beyond the toolbar's curved right end, you find its menu button, illustrated in the figure.
Figure 1: The Quick Access toolbar.
Adding command buttons to the toolbar
You're free to add command buttons to the Quick Access toolbar, such as popular commands you use often or commands missing from the Ribbon.
There are two ways to add a command to the Quick Access toolbar. The easiest way is to right-click a command button on the Ribbon (or just about anywhere in Word) and choose Add to Quick Access Toolbar from the shortcut menu.
The second way to add a command to the Quick Access toolbar is to use its menu. The top several items in the menu are common commands that most folks would enjoy having on the Quick Access toolbar. To add a command, simply select it from the menu.
Not all the commands in Word are listed on the Quick Access toolbar's menu. But that doesn't mean that those commands are excluded. Simply choose the More Commands item from the menu and you see the Word Options dialog box appear. You can use the Customize area in that dialog box to add commands to the toolbar.
When you're done making additions, click the OK button to close the Word Options dialog box and return to Word. There, you can view and treasure your new Quick Access toolbar.
- Word remembers which commands you add to the toolbar. Those same commands will be there the next time you start Word.
 | - Choose the All Commands item from the Choose Commands From menu to view every possible command in Word. Sometimes, a missing command that you think could be elsewhere ends up being available in the All Commands list.
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- Some commands place buttons, and others place drop-down menus or text boxes on the toolbar.
 | - When your command list gets long, consider organizing things. Use the <Separator> item to help group similar commands. The <Separator> appears as a vertical bar on the Quick Access toolbar.
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Removing commands from the toolbar
The easiest way to remove a command from the Quick Access toolbar is to right-click its button. From the pop-up menu, choose Remove from Quick Access Toolbar. Mass removal can also take place in the Word Options dialog box. Choose a command from the right, and then click the Remove button.
You probably shouldn't remove the Undo or Redo commands from the toolbar unless you've really committed the Ctrl+Z and Ctrl+Y keyboard shortcuts to memory.
Restoring the Quick Access toolbar
Clicking the Reset button in the Customize portion of the Word Options dialog box restores the Quick Access toolbar to the standard way it comes with Word. After you click Reset, you see a confirmation dialog box: Click Yes to restore the toolbar as it once was.
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