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Automatically open a task pane when an add-in is installed

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You can configure your add-in's task pane to launch immediately after it's installed. This feature increases usage.

By default, task pane add-ins that do not include any add-in commands open the task pane immediately upon installation. However, when an add-in has one or more add-in commands, then the user is notified of new add-in, but the add-in doesn't launch automatically. This historic default behavior is changing so add-ins that do have add-in commands will launch automatically in some situations. In addition, if the add-in has more than one task pane page, it's possible for you to control whether the add-in launches upon installation and, if so, which page opens in the task pane.

Note

  • This feature applies only to add-ins installed by an end-user, not to centrally deployed add-ins.
  • This feature doesn't apply to Content add-ins or Mail (Outlook) add-ins.
  • This feature applies only to add-ins that have at least one add-in command of the type "task pane command".

New behavior

The new behavior is as follows:

  • If the add-in has just one task pane command, then the add-in's ribbon tab is selected and the task pane opens automatically upon installation. You don't need to configure anything.
  • If the add-in has multiple task pane commands, and one is configured to be the default (see Configure default task pane), then the add-in's ribbon tab is selected and the default task pane opens automatically upon installation.
  • If the add-in has multiple task pane commands, but none is configured to be the default, then the add-in's ribbon tab is selected automatically upon installation and a callout appears near it notifying the user of the new add-in, but no task pane is opened. This is the same as the historic default behavior.

Note

If for any reason, the add-in command that launches the task pane cannot be manually selected by a user at start up, such as when it's configured to be disabled at start up, then it won't be automatically opened regardless of configuration.

Configure default task pane

To designate a task pane as the default, add a TaskpaneId element as the first child of the <Action> element and set its value to Office.AutoShowTaskpaneWithDocument. The following is an example.

<Action xsi:type="ShowTaskpane">
    <TaskpaneId>Office.AutoShowTaskpaneWithDocument</TaskpaneId>
    <SourceLocation resid="Contoso.Taskpane.Url" />
</Action>

Tip

If you want your add-in to automatically launch whenever the user reopens the document, you need to take further configuration steps. For details and advice about when to use this feature, see Automatically open a task pane with a document.

See also