How can I get Microsoft Word 2003 to go left-to-right by default

02
2014-01
  • Joshua Fox

    Whenever I open MSWord 2003, the direction is right-to-left. It becomes very annoying to reset paragraphs back to left-to-right every time. How can I fix this?

    I tried deleting C:\Documents and Settings\<USER>\Application Data\Microsoft\Templates\Normal.dot, to no avail.

    Is there a configuration setting?

    I have Windows XP with English as the primary language but Hebrew enabled as well

    • Answers
  • slotishtype

    You need to change the input language in the control panel -> Time, Language, and Regional Options.

    Here is an article on how to do so.

    Hope this helps.


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    How to get Word 2003 to make my print layout go from left to right?
  • Shaul

    My copy of MS Word 2003 was installed on my computer with the locale set to Israel, so among other things my Normal.dot template was set up for right-to-left. I managed to fix most of the Hebrew support things so that I am working in English by default now. The only thing I haven't found a cure for is how to make the "print layout" view also go from left to right; as things are, the page flow always appears from right to left, even in English documents - IOW, page 1 appears on the right of page 2, as shown below.

    RTL page flow

    I can't see any obvious option to change this. How do I do it?


    • Related Answers
  • 8088

    Your normal.dot file looks fine and even using a machine set to Israel/Hebrew, I am unable to find a fix, but here are some observations and hopefully it can lead you to an answer.

    I think that this is down to the regional options of your machine.

    When using Hebrew on an English machine, I default left to right.

    alt text

    When I change to Israeli/Hebrew, it still acts "the English way", my guess is that you need to look in the Office installation files and see if you can install the English proofing tools - you may also want to try changing your machines default language to English and see if that changes things.

    However, again, wether Hebrew or English, your normal.dot works on my machine even when set to Hebrew/Israel.