Mitigating a broken Normal.mxt

Posted by in ArcMap, GIS

For whatever reason, I’m constantly corrupting my Normal.mxt which causes ArcMap to crash before launching. The remedy is to delete the Normal.mxt at:

C:\Users\*USER*\AppData\Roaming\ESRI\Desktop10.3\ArcMap\Templates\Normal.mxt

which takes with it all my customization settings, the way my toolbars are set up in the interface and all the custom keyboard settings I have.

The last time this happened, I decided to take a minute and set up a way to mitigate this or at least more quickly get back my customizations. So, immediately after this happened the last time, I opened a fresh ArcMap session, set up all the toolbars the way I like along with my keyboard shortcuts, saved and closed the map. I reopened it just to make sure the settings stuck in the Normal.mxt. Once that was confirmed, I copied the Normal.mxt at:

C:\Users\*USER*\AppData\Roaming\ESRI\Desktop10.3\ArcMap\Templates\Normal.mxt [replace *USER* with your computer’s username]

to my desktop.

Next, I wrote a batch file to copy this Normal.mxt (which has all my customizations saved within) and overwrite the Normal.mxt that ArcMap uses.

The command within this batch file looks like this [my own username is replaced with *USER*]:
xcopy /s /y C:\Users\*USER*\Desktop\Normal.mxt C:\Users\*USER*\AppData\Roaming\ESRI\Desktop10.3\ArcMap\Templates

A batch file is an executable version of a windows command. You could paste the line above into the command prompt and hit enter to run. Or, to make a batch file, you can paste it into a text editor and save it with the extension [.bat].

I’ve saved my Replace Normal MXT.bat (the one with the gears below) on my desktop next to a good copy of my Normal.mxt and a shortcut to the Templates folder.

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Now if I have a compromised Normal.mxt, I just double-click Replace Normal MXT.bat and I’m good to go. Saves 10 mins setting up my customizations in ArcMap, which adds up with this recurring issue.

2 Comments

  1. Tomás
    June 10, 2016

    Hi,

    I’ve seen that changing the screen configuration usually kills the Normal.mxt file, and that’s a nightmare in my organization where you are usually going to meetings and connecting to projectors.

    And thanks for te tip! I will implement it right now in case it happens again.

    Reply
  2. Scott
    June 29, 2018

    Brian,

    My custom tool layout often goes awry. It takes time to put it back together – and it’s a bit frustrating. My solution was simply creating a separate copy of the good normal.mxt file and then paste over the corrupt file when things went awry.

    However, your batch process is a much better automated solution. Love it!

    Thank you for sharing!

    Reply

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