How to overwrite a view template from within a module?
You can define the views template path directly within your module (following assumes views 2.x):

/**
 * Implementation of hook_views_api().
 */
function mymodule_views_api() {
  $path = drupal_get_path('module', 'mymodule');
  return array(
    'api' =&gt; 2.0,
    'path' =&gt; $path,
    'template path' =&gt; $path . '/templates',
  );
}


Check out the API documentation built into views for adding templates into your module: http:///help/views/api-default-views (&lt;-- requires advanced help module)