Application Fault in Excel 07 with Add-ins

[Dave]

One of our laptops is having trouble launching the Add-ins manager in Excel
07. Everytime it is launch, Excel crashes with a Faulting Application error
(see the error below). We have tried repairing and reinstalling Office on
the system. Anyone have any suggestions?

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Microsoft Office 12
Event Category: None
Event ID: 1000
Date: 7/30/2007
Time: 12:12:37 PM
User: N/A
Computer: HOSTNAME

Description:
Faulting application excel.exe, version 12.0.6024.5000, stamp 465f21c3,
faulting module unknown, version 0.0.0.0, stamp 00000000, debug? 0, fault
address 0x031d6de0.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

Data:
0000: 41 00 70 00 70 00 6c 00 A.p.p.l.
0008: 69 00 63 00 61 00 74 00 i.c.a.t.
0010: 69 00 6f 00 6e 00 20 00 i.o.n. .
0018: 46 00 61 00 69 00 6c 00 F.a.i.l.
0020: 75 00 72 00 65 00 20 00 u.r.e. .
0028: 20 00 65 00 78 00 63 00 .e.x.c.
0030: 65 00 6c 00 2e 00 65 00 e.l...e.
0038: 78 00 65 00 20 00 31 00 x.e. .1.
0040: 32 00 2e 00 30 00 2e 00 2...0...
0048: 36 00 30 00 32 00 34 00 6.0.2.4.
0050: 2e 00 35 00 30 00 30 00 ..5.0.0.
0058: 30 00 20 00 34 00 36 00 0. .4.6.
0060: 35 00 66 00 32 00 31 00 5.f.2.1.
0068: 63 00 33 00 20 00 69 00 c.3. .i.
0070: 6e 00 20 00 75 00 6e 00 n. .u.n.
0078: 6b 00 6e 00 6f 00 77 00 k.n.o.w.
0080: 6e 00 20 00 30 00 2e 00 n. .0...
0088: 30 00 2e 00 30 00 2e 00 0...0...
0090: 30 00 20 00 30 00 30 00 0. .0.0.
0098: 30 00 30 00 30 00 30 00 0.0.0.0.
00a0: 30 00 30 00 20 00 66 00 0.0. .f.
00a8: 44 00 65 00 62 00 75 00 D.e.b.u.
00b0: 67 00 20 00 30 00 20 00 g. .0. .
00b8: 61 00 74 00 20 00 6f 00 a.t. .o.
00c0: 66 00 66 00 73 00 65 00 f.f.s.e.
00c8: 74 00 20 00 30 00 33 00 t. .0.3.
00d0: 31 00 64 00 36 00 64 00 1.d.6.d.
00d8: 65 00 30 00 0d 00 0a 00 e.0.....

 

[Richard S]

Dave,

Have you found a solution to the above mentioned problem??

I'm having the same problem here; but on around 300 machines. There doesn't
seem to be any obvious rhyme or reason to it!

I'd appreciate any solutions you may have come across!

 

[Dave]

We did find a solution that appears to work for us. If you tell Excel to
require application add-ins to be signed by a trusted publisher, it seems to
correct the problem. I didn't find any documenation to support this. I
basically tried it and it worked.

To set this manually, click on the Excel Options under the Office Button.
Select Trust Center along the left-hand side and click on the Trust Center
Settings button.
Select Add-ins along the left-hand side and check "Require Application
Add-ins to be signed by Trusted Publisher".
Restart Excel.

If you want to set this via GPO, the key is available at:
User Configuration\Administrative Templates\Microsoft Office Excel
2007\Excel Options\Security\Trust Center

 

[Richard S]

Dave,

Thanks for the update! I'll give that a try and let you know!

This is a really strange problem. I've got some people who don't have the
problem; but a bunch that do. There doesn't seem to be any pattern to it or
common denominator. Very, very strange.

Anyway, thanks for the update! I'm going to try your solution in a couple
minutes and will post an update once of my results.

 

[Richard S]

I've tried your fix and it does work great!

Thanks for the info on pushing it through a GPO. I'm making my GPO right now!

 

[Richard S]

Dave,

I'm trying to set up a GPO; but when I look for the key below I don't see
the "Microsoft Office Excel 2007". Can you please verify the path for me?

I appreciate it!

 

[Dave]

Richard,

You'll need to import the Administrative Template for Excel 2007 into your
GPO. You can download them from Microsoft at:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...9A-E143-4AEE-8F7A-E4BBAEBA13E7&displaylang=en

 

[Richard S]

Dave,

Forgive my ignorance; but I would run this file just on my AD server or
every machine I've got?

Thanks so much for your help!!

 

[Dave]

Richard,

Download the file and then run it to extract out the .adm files. You will
then see several of them available for you to import directly into your GPO.
To do that, right-click on Administrative Templates and select Add/Remove
Templates from within the Group Policy Management Console. This will
automatcially copy the .adm file up to your Domain Controller in the correct
location.

If you are new to using GPO's and using Administrative Templates, I
recommend you get a book to read over on how they work. They can make your
life easier, but if done incorrectly, they can be hell.

The book I recommend is Microsoft Windows Group Policy Guide:
http://www.microsoft.com/products/i...ge&catid=7dd90809-6d4d-47f4-9d13-e3df27ac09ba

 

[Richard S]

Dave,

Thanks for all the great help! I've got the template pushed out to all my
student accounts and the Excel problem is now resolved! I couldn't have done
it without your help!

I did buy the group policy guide you suggested and the administrator's
automation toolkit as well.

Thanks again for the help!

 

[ujourney13]

I've got to say thanks this problem has been driving me crazy, but the
solution you posted seems to be working just fine.