I've just installed Office 97 on a secondhand PC I've obtained running XP Professional.



If I try to create a shortcut from a document in either Word or Excel to the desktop I get the message:

"X - This action is only valid for products that are currently installed"

Also the spell checker works fine in Word, but when I try to use it in Outlook Express 6 I get the message:

"X - An error occured while the spelling was being checked"

Is this an XL issue (I have SP3) or an Office 97 issue?

Thanks for any suggestions.

Rod

Regarding the "X - An error occured while the spelling was being checked" error, I've found a solution, it's to download the file:

csapi3tl.exe from:

http://www.tech-pro.net/howto_010.html

This cured the problem.

I'm still trying to cure the other problem !

Any suggestions?

Very strange. How did you create the shortcut? By Send To > Destop (create shortcut)?

Either by Windows Explorer and 'send to desktop' or by Word/Excel then 'send to desktop'.

There are a number of items on the www about the issue, but none refer to my XL Professional SP3 / Office 97 setup.

It is the same issue on all the Office 97 programs.

What happens if you just create a shortcut to another file and modify its target (Right click on the shortcut file and select Properties) to your file?

I think the shortcut is just a pointer, it shouldn't even care what kind of files it links to.

Just tried that, created it as a Word shortcut then changed the target to an Excel shortcut, same message?

I've also just found that if I create a message in Outlook Express and attach a file, I can't open the file in the created message by clicking on it, or open it as the sent message.

The only other 'odd' thing I've found is that in Outlook Explorer 6/Tools/Internet Options/Programs/Email only Microsoft Outlook appears or a blank, even though I have Outlook Express as my default mail handler.

I've alreasdy re-installed Office 97

Could you take a look at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/907342

This appears to be similar, the problem is I'm using Office 97 so the suggested methods can't be used. Do you know what they mean by 'corrupted shortcut to the Office program that your trying to start' I've cleared all the existing shortcuts and remade them, and still get the same message.

I think the article refers to shortcuts in the Start menu; if a shortcut stopped working, it's corrupted.

Sorry, I really have no idea. To my knowledge, a shortcut should be created no matter what. Even If it doesn't work, that's a different problem.