Setting up a Shared Design Journal Template

The design journal is a document called Design Journal.docx that is embedded into a Solidworks document. It appears in the design binder folder in the FeatureManager design tree. The Design Journal resembles an engineering journal, with headings for File Name, Description, and Material. These fields are linked to document properties and updated whenever the journal is opened. File Name is the actual file name and Description and Material are SOLIDWORKS document custom properties.

In some cases it is desirable to set up a custom shared design journal template. This way several Solidworks users can access the same customized design  journal template from a shared network location.  

The first step to setting up a shared template is to locate the default design journal template. The default journal template is located in install_dir\lang\language\.  It is named journal.docx or journal.doc, depending on your installation. Create a copy of this word document. Do not rename the document at any point in this process. If the document is renamed, Solidworks will not recognize it.

Edit the copy of the journal.docx as you wish. When you are done editing the template, move it to a network location that all users of Solidworks can access. Now you will need to point Solidworks to this network location. Open Solidworks and navigate to Tools>Options>System Options>File Locations. In the "Show folders for" drop down menu, select "Design Journal Template". Select "Add..." and navigate to the network folder that contains the journal.docx file. Solidworks will now look to this location for a file called journal.docx before it looks to the default location in your installation directory. If the network connection is working and Solidworks finds the file, it will load it. If for any reason Solidworks cannot locate the file, it will pull the design journal template from the default location in the install directory.