Users of pre-2007 versions of Office can install a free converter:

Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007
File Formats
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...displaylang=en

best wishes
--
Bernard V Liengme
Microsoft Excel MVP
http://people.stfx.ca/bliengme
remove caps from email

"grace" wrote in message
...
Issue 1:

If I take a Excel 2007 file saved with a "xlsx" file extension and I
manually change the filename extension to "xls", then I open the Excel
file
using Excel 2003, it displays the following popup message to the user:

"This file is not in a recognizable format.
- If you know the file is from another probram which is incompatible with
Microsoft Office Excel, click Cancel, then open this file in its original
application. If you want to open the file later in Microsoft Office
Excel,
save it in a format that is compatible, such as text format.
- If you suspect the file is damaged, click Help for more information
about
solving the problem.
- If you still want to see what text is contained in the file, click OK.
Then click Finished in the Text Import Wizard."


This popup has an "OK" button and "Cancel" button which the user will need
to click on either of the buttons first before the Excel file is opened.

How do I stop this popup message from appearing as we do not want any
human
interactions performed before the Excel file is opened?
__________________________________________________ ___________________

Issue 2:

When opening Excel 2007 files using Excel 2003, it displays the following
popup message to the user:

"This file was created in a newer version of Microsoft Excel. The file
has
been converted to a format you can work with, but the following issues
were
encountered. The file has been opened in read-only mode to protect the
original file.

- Some formulas in this workbook contain functions with more arguments
than
are supported by this version of Excel. Formulas with more than 30
arguments
to a function will not be opened and will be converted to #VALUE! errors.
- Some formulas in this workbook use more operands than are allowed by
this
version of Excel. These formulas will not be opened and will be converted
to
#VALUE! errors."

This popup has an "OK" button which the user will need to click on before
the Excel file is opened.

How do I stop this popup message from appearing as we do not want any
human
interactions to occur when an Excel file is opened?

__________________________________________________ ___________________

Please note that Issue #1 is more important for us so if this can be
resolved first, that will be great. Thank you.