Fix: Error when double clicking an Excel file: Windows cannot find the file

Products by on December 17, 2007 at 12:14 pm

If you don’t have this error, don’t bother reading this post. It took some time to find a fix and my hope that this post will help others in the future.

Somehow my Excel installation got into a funky state where I had problems opening files from anywhere but inside Excel.

Firefox gave me this error message when I tried to open an excel file off an Excel link:

associated helper application does not exist

Windows explorer gave me this error message when I doubleclicked the file from anywhere (desktop, windows explorer, etc.):

Windows cannot find ‘path\file’

In both of these cases, Excel would open but no file would load. It took a bit of digging, but this blog post put me on to the solution - I had to unregister and regregister Excel.

The original post was originally written for Excel 2003. If you’re running 2008, here are the steps you need to follow:

  1. In Excel, click the Microsoft Office Button (in the top left), click Excel Options (at the bottom of the menu box on the right), click the Advanced category, and then under the General section, clear the Ignore other applications that use Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) check box.
  2. In Windows, open a command prompt: Start > Run will get you the run dialog box. Then enter “cmd”
  3. Navigate to the directory of your Excel installation. On my machine that is C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12
  4. Enter this command: excel.exe /unregserver
  5. then enter this command: excel.exe /regserver
I would expect that a similar fix would work if Word, Powerpoint or other Office programs end up in a similar state.

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147 Comments

  1. Ananth — March 9, 2011 @ 8:01 pm

    Thank you so much, it was really helpful.

  2. Mike — March 24, 2011 @ 10:48 am

    Whoo Hoooo U R da MAN !!! It worked 4 me !!! Thanx

  3. Anonymous — April 1, 2011 @ 6:19 pm

    Wow! It’s posts like this that restore my faith in humanity. I can’t tell you how annoying that was… oh yeah, you know. Thanks!

  4. MarkeyC — April 29, 2011 @ 2:24 pm

    Brilliant – Just fixed my friend’s Office 2007 installation with this – It’s been driving her nuts for the last year and she uses spreadsheets daily for her charity work in Haiti!

    Thank you so much.

  5. Mapers — May 9, 2011 @ 11:29 am

    Perffect. Tks.

  6. Guest — June 15, 2011 @ 10:05 pm

    You rock! Thanks!

  7. Tad449 — July 5, 2011 @ 2:58 pm

    you rock –  that worked

  8. Fixed — August 4, 2011 @ 5:09 am

    Worked Like a charm! Thanks been looking far and wide for the fix to associate excel files and word files with the program.

  9. Guest — September 4, 2011 @ 6:30 pm

    The instruction works really well. I had a similar problem with PaintShopPro 9 — It would not open the graphics files when I double clicking them in Windows Explorer. The only way I can open the files is when I’m inside of the PaintShopPro. Even when I reinstall PSP again, I still had the same error. With this instruction (unregserver and then regserver), it works like a charm. THANKS!

  10. Frank — October 10, 2011 @ 11:04 pm

    Thanks a lot.

    Great fix!!!

  11. Nicolaud28 — October 11, 2011 @ 11:09 am

    I love you dude. Thanks so much

  12. BV — October 14, 2011 @ 4:37 pm

    Thanx!!! :)

  13. Mike — October 26, 2011 @ 8:51 pm

    Thanks!

  14. Simon — October 29, 2011 @ 2:55 pm

    That actually worked in 2007, thank you. It has been bugging me for ages, but I finally got around to looking into a fix, and this did it. Many thanks.

  15. Keith — November 1, 2011 @ 3:15 pm

    Aweomse!  That worked like a charm!

  16. Flow Snowboards — November 5, 2011 @ 3:43 am

    YOU”VE SAVED ME!!!!   I’ve been plagued with this issue for over a year and could not find a solution   THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!! 

  17. zabeeh ullah — January 13, 2012 @ 4:00 pm

    when i double click ms word 2007 or 2003 he can’t open and no error appear in screen.??????please help me

  18. lester — January 29, 2012 @ 12:36 am

    thank you so much this worked great!

  19. Kakashi_aza — January 30, 2012 @ 8:31 am

    thanks a lot. the problem fix !!! it solve my problem.. many thanks

  20. Girish — January 31, 2012 @ 5:35 pm

    Amazing, this worked, except that in Windows Vista, I dod not go to CMD. After going to Start/Run, I put in  excel /unregserver, closed Excel typed in excel /regserver and closed Excel again.

  21. Deb — February 16, 2012 @ 6:52 am

    Fantastic – thanks so much this has been driving me nuts!  I also have Vista so copying and pasting commands 4 and then 5 directly into the start search bar worked for me too :)

  22. Shaz — February 22, 2012 @ 12:28 pm

    It worked :)
    Thanks a lot………
    From
    India

  23. Gabrieldiaziii — March 2, 2012 @ 6:56 pm

    FANTASTIC.  After four days of chasing this thing down you were the only one that had the solution!  Thank you very much!

  24. Choyle — March 7, 2012 @ 12:04 am

    This article is great and worked well.  THANK YOU!!!!!

  25. Thang — March 27, 2012 @ 10:44 am

    Thanks a lot!!!!!. It is very usefull

  26. Jean — April 19, 2012 @ 1:53 pm

    Thanks,
    I had the problem and my helpdesk could not find any solution. Looked problem up, found your advice and…. it works!
    Thanks a lot.

  27. Guest — May 17, 2012 @ 12:54 pm

    Thanks! Awesome fix…

  28. Vijender — August 29, 2012 @ 8:31 am

    Thanks

  29. Rahul — September 19, 2012 @ 6:22 am

    Cheers!!!.. Bang upon.

  30. Geek82 — November 26, 2012 @ 4:59 pm

    Awesome…….thanks…just saved me a lot of time

  31. vinny — November 29, 2012 @ 10:55 am

    Awesome stuff, thanks mate.

  32. smrazi — February 13, 2013 @ 6:57 am

    Many Thanks,

  33. Sanjay — July 4, 2013 @ 11:21 am

    Thanks a lot it still works

  34. Vipul — July 29, 2013 @ 12:02 pm

    Thank you very very very much !!!! Worked like a charm ! Brilliant !

  35. Bart — August 9, 2013 @ 9:20 am

    Thank you! I had been trying a lot of other solutions, but this is the only one that worked for me. Great work!

  36. MRL — October 24, 2013 @ 11:20 pm

    You rock! Thanks!!

  37. vivek — January 27, 2014 @ 5:34 am

    Thansk a loyt

  38. Chris — April 11, 2015 @ 4:31 pm

    Thank you, this worked! I only had to unchecked the box: “Ignore other applications that use Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE)” and now I can double-click an Excel file and it starts properly. Thank you again.

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