Although Microsoft Office suites are available for both Windows and Mac users, Office only generates files with the *.pip extension for Windows versions. If you’re looking for files you can delete to clean up your hard drive, don’t delete *.pip files -- otherwise, you’ll get error messages when you run Office programs. You can change how *.pip files behave -- all you need is a better understanding of what they do.
Microsoft Personal Menus
- All Microsoft Office suites since Office XP have offered you the ability to personalize your menus -- whether you knew it or not. Rather than ask you a series of questions or give you a submenu with a list of options, Office programs instead learn what menu options you prefer to use from your behavior. All of this information gets stored in a special Microsoft-proprietary file with the extension *.pip. File naming conventions vary slightly between versions of Office, but the extension is always the same. For example, a Microsoft Access personal menu file from Office XP would be named “Access10.pip”, while one from Office 2000 would be named “Access.pip." Your Office programs update and generate these files as you use Office programs, so your preferences are always up-to-date.
Shortened Menus
- As your Office programs learn your habits, they begin to display shortened, customized menus to you when you open menus from each Office program’s Toolbar. These menus show only your most-used programs as a convenience feature. If you’d like to see the full menu instead of your customized menu, you have two options. To get rid of the customized menus entirely and see only the full menu, open View > Toolbars > Customize > Options and check “Always show full menus.” To get the best of both worlds, go to View > Toolbars > Customize > Options and select “Show full menus after a short delay." That way, you’ll see your customized menu open first, followed by the full menu a few seconds later.
Considerations
- If you want to start over completely, for example if you’ve inherited a computer from someone else in your family and have completely different preferences, you can reset Office menus to factory settings. Simply go to View > Toolbars > Customize > Options and click “Reset menu and toolbar usage data”. You’ll receive a prompt explaining that you’re about to delete your previous user preferences, and asking if you really want to do this. Click “Yes” and exit the menu.
Warning
- Occasionally, your *.pip files can become corrupted, which will give you problems when you try to run affected Office programs. If you start getting strange error messages when you open an Office program, search for that program’s *.pip file using the Search feature in your version of Windows so you can rename it. The exact file names for *.pip files in different versions of Office are slightly different, so if you’re not sure of the name, just search for “*.pip” to pull up all *.pip files. Although the file names are different, you’ll be able to tell which one is the correct *.pip file because it will contain the name of the appropriate program, such as “Access” or “Word." Right-click your mouse on that *.pip file to rename it, then open the program again. Your affected program should work properly now, and will begin collecting new data about your preferences and assembling a new *.pip file to replace the one you renamed.
