Double clicking Office 2003 document opens blank document

[Bob]

Double clicking any Office 2003 document icon (Excel, Word, PowerPoint, etc)
in Windows Explorer results in the correct Office application opening to a
blank document. Using filepen within the application opens the document.
The icon image and the settings in file types are correct.

I have run repair in the Office installer and done both spyware and virus
scans. All other document icons open correctly in their applications.

Any suggstions are appreciated. Thank you.

Bob

 

[Keme]

Double clicking any Office 2003 document icon (Excel, Word, PowerPoint, etc)
in Windows Explorer results in the correct Office application opening to a
blank document. Using filepen within the application opens the document.
The icon image and the settings in file types are correct.

I have run repair in the Office installer and done both spyware and virus
scans. All other document icons open correctly in their applications.

Any suggstions are appreciated. Thank you.

Bob

I have sometimes seen errors in the "file open" action entry in the file
type dialog. You can check this:

- Open Windows Explorer
- Menu selection: "Tools - folder options"
- Select tab "File types"
- Select an Office file type (e.g. "DOC") in the list.
- Click the "Advanced" button

You should get a list of actions (open, print, new, edit, ...). Select
one of them ("Open" is the default, and would be a good place to start)
and click the "edit..." button.

If "use DDE" is checked you should get several fields, one of which is
called "DDE message" or something like that (just below the "use DDE"
checkbox). The second (or possibly the first) command in the DDE message
should be [FileOpen("%1")]. I have sometimes seen [FileOpen(%1)] (note
the missing quotation marks). If that is the case and the path to the
document contains spaces, explorer will not find it (because spaces
outside quotes are to be treated as separators), and delivers an empty
file to the application instead. Inserting the quotation marks should
fix the problem.

If "Use DDE" is not checked, you should see a %1 at the end of the
command line. That should be inside separate quotes, too. Any command
line options present (those items starting with a forward slash) should
not be quoted. Something like:
"C:\Program files\Microsoft Office\OFFICE11\WINWORD.EXE" /n "%1"

 

[garfield-n-odie]

If you're using Symantec/Norton AntiVirus, try disabling the Office
Plugin that comes with it. See
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=329820 "How to use Office programs
with the Norton AntiVirus Office plug-in" for more information.