Make the "Overwrite existing file(s)" check box to be unselected by default in SPS 2003

Following the post from Make the "Overwrite existing file" check box to be unselected by default in MOSS 2007, this post is to show how to do the same trick in SPS 2003.

Due to the structural change between SPS 2003 and MOSS 2007, it takes a bit more effort and steps to accomplish this in SPS 2003 but it’s doable.

However, PLEASE NOTE : modifying any OOB (Out Of the Box) files is unsupported, so it’d be a good idea to keep a backup of the files that needs modification. It’s also a good idea to keep a backup of the *modified* files, just in case you don’t miss the customizations if those files were to be overwritten by future patches.

You might also want to review 898631 to understand what constitutes a support and unsupported scenario.

Well that said, here’s how you can make the “Overwrite existing file” check box to be unselected by default.

1. Open C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\60\template\1033\STS\LISTS\DOCLIB

2. Back up Schema.xml file in the same folder with a different extension (e.g., schema.xml.oob)

3. Pop open the schema.xml file and find the following line:

<INPUT type=hidden name="putopts" id=putopts value="true">

4. Change value=”true” to value=”false”

5. Also, in the same schema.xml file, find this line (which is after 10 lines from the above line)

<INPUT TYPE=CHECKBOX name="overwrite" id=overwrite value="true" CHECKED onclick="setputopts()" tabindex=1 title="]]><![CDATA[Overwrite]]><![CDATA[">

6. Delete the word CHECKED from the above line.

7. Save the schema.xml file and do an IISRESET.

But remember we did this modification only in STS template, which mean we’ll only be able to see this change in Team Site templates. To see this change in all the templates, we will need to do changes to all the default templates.