Excel 2003 running in Win7

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Hi All,

This may be a Win 7 question since it relates to differences in Excel 2003 when running under Win 7 vs when running under Win XP. But here goes anyway.

I thought there was an option in Excel 2003 or maybe the previous version to say whether you want it to run in single-window mode or multi-window mode – the difference being that multiple workbooks can be opened in a single Excel window vs 1 workbook per Excel window. Regardless, I can’t seem to find that now.

When I double-click (open) an Excel 2003 file under Win 7, it opens in a new Excel window. Under Win XP, when I did that, it opened in an existing window if there was one. Suppose I had one open because I’d like to copy a sheet from the 2nd workbook to the first. With Win 7, I can’t just double-click the 2nd workbook and get it to open in the existing window. So when it opens and I try to move/copy a sheet to the first opened workbook, Excel knows nothing about that one, so my choices for copying/moving are the 2nd workbook or a new workbook; the first one is NOT listed. A way around this is to open the 2nd workbook within the first/only Excel window. But I don’t usually work that way.

This also affects switching between workbooks. I am very used to CTRL+F6 to switch between workbooks within a single Excel window. Moving the mouse to the Taskbar to choose the other Excel button or using ALT+Tab to move between multiple Excel windows is nowhere near as convenient.

Am I missing something ???

TIA.

Fred

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Tools, options, View tab, Windows in task bar.

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Check Tools-Options-General tab and make sure the Ignore Other Applications option is not checked. If it isn’t, we may need to edit the registry manually.

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I am very used to CTRL+F6 to switch between workbooks within a single Excel window.

I just tried opening 2 workbooks by double clicking them in Windows Explorer they both opened in the same window and I had no problem switching using the Ctrl+F6. I checked the “The Windows in Task Bar” setting and it was checked. I unchecked this option and tried the same process and again it worked as above. So unless I am missing something I can’t reproduce the problem on my Win 7 machine with Excel 2003 SP-3.

RG

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Thanks for all the replies.

I have my options set as others have suggested:
– Ignore Other Apps is NOT checked
– Windows In Taskbar doesn’t seem to make a diff whether it’s checked – either way, double clicking still results in 2 windows w/o the ability to CTRL+F6 between them.

So switching between workbooks by going thru the Taskbar is a pain. BUT not being able to copy/move a worksheet from one book to the other is unacceptable.

Rory – Ready for the Registry hack.

I should say that Excel 2003 is running w/o any patches – SP nothing. I just loaded it onto this new Win 7 PC and haven’t applied any SPs yet. MS keeps telling me that I should download SP3 at 108 MB. Since I expect to move to 2007 soon (in fact, it’s loaded on this PC also but I’m just not using it yet), I resisted a 108 MB download.

Fred

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Did you install 2003 after 2007?

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Rory,

Yep, 2003 was installed after 2007 (I had another thread about that on the General Productivity Office Bd a few weeks ago; things are working well for now so I’m not inclined to uninstall Office 2007 for now even tho I’m not using it).

Fred

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OK – I’ll assume you know that is not recommended…

Try doing Start-Run:
“C:Program FilesMicrosoft OfficeOffice11excel.exe” /unregserver

then Start-Run:
“C:Program FilesMicrosoft OfficeOffice11excel.exe” /regserver

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Rory,

Thanks for the “registry” items.

I’ve learned that I should have put in 2003 before 2007 (for some reason I thought it was the other way around). I can uninstall 2007 for now since I’m not really using it and won’t want to for a few more months. If I uninstall 2007 now and re-install it at some time in the future, can I skip the 2 commands you posted?

Also, should I assume that you know that, under Win7, there is a folder called “Progam Files” and another called “Program Files (x86)” and that Office 11 lives under the latter? Also, to get my dual installation to work, I had to rename the Office 11 version of Excel.exe to Excel2003.exe (anything would have done to distinguish it from Excel.exe that lives in the Office 12 folder).

Fred

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Removing 2007 and doing a detect and repair from 2003 setup *should* work.

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Are you using 64bit Windows?
If you had done the installation the other way round you should not have needed to rename anything (I never have)

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Rory,

This is 64-bit Win 7.

I think what I’ll do is uninstall Office 2007 and do the repair that Jan Karel suggested. If that doesn’t work, I’ll uninstall 2003 and reinstall in the right order of 2003 followed by 2007.

By the time I have that kind of time, I’ll probably be ready for 2007 by itself w/o the safety net of 2003 (but maybe with the 2003 menus for 2007 that were suggested further back in the thread).

One of the problems with the rename approach, which I found in some blog, is that a copy of the file with the original name is still in the Office 11 folder. So I have an Excel.exe AND an Excel2003.exe in the same folder. I tried to rename the original Excel.exe and ended up with 2 copies (same Mod date and same size).

Fred

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