Template Madness!!! Insights Anyone??

[markl -at- dicecorp -dot- com]

I am working on a set of training manuals. We currently distribute 8 of
these manuals and have nearly 30 planned for future development. I want to
do some light editing on the 8 and develop a standard template before
attempting to complete the set, but I am running into some confusing
document behavior in Word.

First, in Word 2002 (documets created in Word 2000), the Attach button is
greyed out, and the Properties say Microsoft Word 97-2002 Template.
However, the documents are all saved as .doc files, not .dot. When I try
to save as, the follwoing error pops up: "After saving this document in
Word Document all AutoText entries will be lost and the document can no
longer be used as an Add-In. Do you want to save in this format anyway?"
Clicking Yes does not have an immediate affect; after closing and
repopening, however, the program seems to treat the file normally (as
.doc, can attach a template, etc.). The documents do not seem to have any
Add-ins before or after doing save as.

In Word 2000, the Attach button is also greyed out. However, the
Properties\Type window says Microsoft Word Document, and Save As only
allows saving as .dot. Further, two Global Templates and Add-Ins appear in
the Organizer: wrdemo.wll and PDFmaker.dot (the Word 2002 machine does not
have Acrobat Exchange).

So, from all this, I have several questions:
1. Does losing the wrdemo.wll add-in affect anything important?
2. Has anyone developed documentation using each manual as its own
template? Why would writers do this?
3. Has anyone ever worked on files like these .doc template files?
4. Does anyone know a good way to make these files into standard Word
Documents I can apply standard .dot templates to?
5. How can a document be used as an add-in (from error message)? What is
the deal with that?

Thanks...

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