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Macros, tips, and templates for Corel® WordPerfect® for Windows®
© Copyright 1996-2023 by Barry MacDonnell. All Rights Reserved.

Customize your menu - How to add, edit, rearrange, or remove menu items

Do you need more WordPerfect features or macros available from the top menu?

Do you want to organize the menu items you already have there?

This page will show you how.

Notes ¤  "Menu" as used here refers to the row of labels that you see at the top of your screen, such as File, Edit, View ... Help. [Some users call it a "toolbar" but in WordPerfect a toolbar is different from a menu (see here for more on toolbars and property bars).] ¤  "Menu selection" generally refers to an individual label on that menu (as in "click the File menu selection then click Open..."). ¤  "Menu item" generally means a sub-menu choice available under a menu selection -- but it can also refer to a single item (menu selection) on the top menu bar. The meaning should be clear from the context of the sentence in which it appears. ¤  Menus, like toolbars and keyboard definitions, are normally stored in the user's default template, which is a special file on your disk. If you customize your menu as described below, the template file is updated with the changes. (These customized items can be migrated to other computers or newer WordPerfect versions.) ¤  Note that there are several available menus that ship with WordPerfect. The normal (default) menu is shown in the image above and also listed as <WordPerfect Menu> (shown in the graphic in Step 1 below). [Note that Microsoft Word users might have deliberately chosen one of the MS Word menus -- and if so, some items might be missing from the menu or sub-menus. See here for why this happens and what you can do about it.] ☼  To migrate customizations from a menu in another version of WordPerfect, it is best to re-create them in the current version: see steps below (also see here for some tips).

Quick Links

Step 1: How to create a NEW MENU SELECTION on the top menu.

Step 2: How to ADD CHOICES (i.e., menu items) to the new menu (or an existing menu).

Step 3: (Optional) How to MOVE MENU ITEMS from one menu selection to another.

Step 4: (Optional) How to EDIT MENU ITEMS.

Step 5: (Optional) How to REMOVE MENU ITEMS.

Tips  (Creating sub-menus; backing up and restoring menus; migrating a menu from another WordPerfect version; etc.)

Step 1: How to create a NEW MENU SELECTION on the top menu.

In Step 1 you will first create a new menu selection — a label like the existing ones (File, View, etc.) — on the top menu. Then you can add menu items under it or relocate it under an existing menu selection.

Here's how to do it.

•  Either -

Click on Tools, Settings, Customize;

•  or -

Right-click on the top menu bar (the one with File, Edit, View, etc.); from the drop list that appears, click on "Settings....".

With either choice the Customize Settings dialog appears:



•  On the Customize Settings dialog's Menus tab, in the "Available menus" pane, click once on the menu you want to customize to choose it. Generally this is the <WordPerfect Menu> or the <WordPerfect N Menu> (where "N" is your version number, unless you have previously created a customized menu — in which case, click on that one).

•  Then click Edit to bring up the Menu Editor. (The Menu Editor is shown in the next image below; you can drag the dialog to reposition it.)

In the Menu Editor dialog you'll see an indented box on the right side labeled Menu, just above the box labeled Separator.



•  Hold down your left mouse button and drag the Menu icon  from its box up and onto the (empty) right side of WordPerfect's top menu bar. (See next image.) Release the mouse button to drop the icon on this empty area of the menu bar.

•  Next, move your cursor over this new menu selection (which is temporarily labeled "Menu" by default), and when it turns to a blue background (assuming you use default Windows colors) to indicate it is selected, double click it.

Note

If you prefer using the keyboard to the mouse to access this menu later, you can type an ampersand (&) immediately before any letter in the name that you want to use as a mnemonic; this will select (open) the menu if you use the keyboard's [Alt+<letter>] key combination.

For example, if the menu is labeled "Letterheads" you would type this in the Menu Item field (without quotes):

   &Letterheads

This produces a label on the menu with an underlined letter (the mnemonic):

   Letterheads

[Tip: Some recent versions of Windows might have hidden the underlined letters by default. See "Windows underlined <Alt> key shortcuts - How to display hidden underlines on menus and dialogs" here.]

When the cursor is in a document (not in a dialog), pressing <Alt+L> will open the Letterheads menu (assuming <Alt+L> is not already assigned to some other feature, program, keystrokes, or macro).

If the menu items -- the "choices" in Step 2 below -- listed on the Letterheads menu also have mnemonics in their names, just type a mnemonic letter immediately (i.e., without pressing <Alt>) to choose that menu item.

See the Tips section below about using multiple mnemonics on sub-menus.

•  Click OK when you are done editing the menu name and Quick Tip.

•  To add choices to the new menu leave the Menu Editor open on your screen (or you can reopen it later) and continue with the instructions in Step 2 below.

Example: To launch an external Windows program or a PDF file:

Click the Programs tab, then the Add Program button. The Open File dialog appears. Choose the program's executable file (.exe) or the Adobe (.pdf) file and click Open.

•  You'll notice the item -- e.g., the feature name, or the macro's filename (without extension) -- was placed on the top menu, just to the right of the new menu selection created in Step 1 above.

You'll probably want to move it underneath the new menu selection to make it a menu item. [Or, you can move it under an existing menu or leave it on the top menu bar if you wish; if you do that, skip to the next bullet section on renaming the item.]

Here's the trick to moving the new item:

▸ Carefully place your cursor over the new item (e.g., the feature or macro's name; in this example it's labeled "Letterheads") on the top menu bar until it turns reverse color (i.e., it's now "selected");

    then -

▸ Hold down the left mouse button and drag the name (here, "Letterheads") leftward over to the new menu selection;

    then -

▸ Drag it downward to the empty menu area that pops up just under the new menu selection's name (here, "Stationery");

    then -

▸ Drop it there.



Essentially this is a "go left, then go down" action with your mouse, done while holding down the left mouse button.

For additional menu items you can drag-and-drop the feature name or macro name either below or above any existing menu items. A heavy horizontal line will appear to guide your placement. You also can add a separator line between menu items by dragging and dropping a separator from the Menu Editor window (see just under the indented Menu box on the Editor).

For sub-menus, you can click the Menu icon on the Menu Editor dialog (see Step 1) and drag it to a location under a menu selection, at the proper position among the other menu items. You will want to rename it (see next paragraph below), then add (drag) items to the sub-menu.

•  With the Menu Editor still open, you can rename the menu item or sub-menu by carefully positioning your mouse over it. When the item's name turns reverse color, double click it and rename it in the pop up box. In the same way that you can add an Alt-key mnemonic to the menu selection, you can type an ampersand (&) immediately before any letter in the menu item's name. Click OK to exit the dialog box.

See the Tips section below about using multiple mnemonics on sub-menus.

•  Click OK when you are done to close the Menu Editor, then click Close in the Customize Settings window.

•  If you later decide to delete a menu selection or one of its (sub-)menu items, simply bring up the Menu Editor and drag the selection from the top menu bar (which will remove all its items, too), or just drag the desired item from under the menu selection.

•  To restore the menu to the factory default: Right-click on the menu and choose Settings. Select the menu in the list if it isn't already selected. Click Reset.

¤  Removing menu items does not delete macros from your disk.

Normally, leaving your macro files (*.wcm files) on your disk is a good thing, since you might need them later.

However, if you really want to delete the menu's macros too, you can right-click a macro's filename from the Play Macro dialog (click Tools, Macro, Play) or from any Windows file dialog, and choose Delete from the context menu.