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#1
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Ignore Other Applications" setting
Short version: Is there a registry setting for the "Ignore Other
Applications" setting? Long version: Many people here have problems opening Excel files that are remedied by: 1. Opening Excel, and clicking on 'Tools | Options... | General' tab. 2. Uncheck "Ignore Other Applications". I also know this property can be set in Excel VBA: Application.IgnoreRemoteRequests = False However, there are a LOT of computers that seem to have this problem. I figured that if this is being stored in a registry entry somewhere, I can remotely connect to the user's registry, and set the value to false from there, instead of having to run around to 100+ PC's, and repeat the processes listed here. Any ideas? Thanks! |
#2
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Ignore Other Applications" setting
It is stored in the Options key of the section:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\9.0\Ex cel\Options (09.0 adjusted with the user version of excel i guess) Now, the issue is that this key is an aggregate of several options. After trying setting and unsetting the Ignore Other Application Requests, reading the registry each time, and converting the hexadecimal value in binary, it seems like it corresponds to the 7th bit (from the right): ... 0100 0000 (For me, mixed with the other options, it switches from 0x00000013 to 0x00000053) .... but that's just a guess from my part... -- Regards, Sébastien <http://www.ondemandanalysis.com |
#3
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Ignore Other Applications" setting
Hi Joel,
You can modify the Ignore Other Applications setting directly in the registry. Unfortunately, it's not a simple True/False setting but rather part of a bitmask that stores several settings packed into a single numeric value. Because of this, modifying this setting in the registry correctly is not that much easier than doing it through Excel. My real question is why so many people at your organization have Ignore Other Applications set to True? This is not its default value, but it's very common for badly written Excel VBA applications to turn this setting off when they start up and not turn it back on when they exit. If this is what's going on, then even if you go around and turn it off you're likely to see it back on as soon as everyone has run the problem application again. I'd suggest working with a couple of machines for a while to see if you can narrow down the program that's causing the problem and either get it fixed or get rid of it. -- Rob Bovey, Excel MVP Application Professionals http://www.appspro.com/ * Take your Excel development skills to the next level. * Professional Excel Development http://www.appspro.com/Books/Books.htm "Joel" wrote in message ... Short version: Is there a registry setting for the "Ignore Other Applications" setting? Long version: Many people here have problems opening Excel files that are remedied by: 1. Opening Excel, and clicking on 'Tools | Options... | General' tab. 2. Uncheck "Ignore Other Applications". I also know this property can be set in Excel VBA: Application.IgnoreRemoteRequests = False However, there are a LOT of computers that seem to have this problem. I figured that if this is being stored in a registry entry somewhere, I can remotely connect to the user's registry, and set the value to false from there, instead of having to run around to 100+ PC's, and repeat the processes listed here. Any ideas? Thanks! |
#4
Posted to microsoft.public.excel.programming
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Ignore Other Applications" setting
Joel,
Is there some app on the system that is setting this to TRUE ? NickHK "Joel" wrote in message ... Short version: Is there a registry setting for the "Ignore Other Applications" setting? Long version: Many people here have problems opening Excel files that are remedied by: 1. Opening Excel, and clicking on 'Tools | Options... | General' tab. 2. Uncheck "Ignore Other Applications". I also know this property can be set in Excel VBA: Application.IgnoreRemoteRequests = False However, there are a LOT of computers that seem to have this problem. I figured that if this is being stored in a registry entry somewhere, I can remotely connect to the user's registry, and set the value to false from there, instead of having to run around to 100+ PC's, and repeat the processes listed here. Any ideas? Thanks! |
#5
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Ignore Other Applications" setting
That was my next question, "What the heck is causing this?" But for now, I'm
just trying to see if there is a way I can set this remotely, without disrupting the users, for several hundred users. Again, running around from PC to PC doesn't sound like much fun... You mention it's part of a bitmask...which one? sebasitan3 wrote to check the 7th bit of HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\9.0\Ex cel\Options. I could try HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\E xcel\Options since we're on Office XP here. But, when I change the setting in Excel, I don't notice any change in the registry. Do you have to reboot to see the change or something? Thanks again, Joel "Rob Bovey" wrote: Hi Joel, You can modify the Ignore Other Applications setting directly in the registry. Unfortunately, it's not a simple True/False setting but rather part of a bitmask that stores several settings packed into a single numeric value. Because of this, modifying this setting in the registry correctly is not that much easier than doing it through Excel. My real question is why so many people at your organization have Ignore Other Applications set to True? This is not its default value, but it's very common for badly written Excel VBA applications to turn this setting off when they start up and not turn it back on when they exit. If this is what's going on, then even if you go around and turn it off you're likely to see it back on as soon as everyone has run the problem application again. I'd suggest working with a couple of machines for a while to see if you can narrow down the program that's causing the problem and either get it fixed or get rid of it. -- Rob Bovey, Excel MVP Application Professionals http://www.appspro.com/ * Take your Excel development skills to the next level. * Professional Excel Development http://www.appspro.com/Books/Books.htm "Joel" wrote in message ... Short version: Is there a registry setting for the "Ignore Other Applications" setting? Long version: Many people here have problems opening Excel files that are remedied by: 1. Opening Excel, and clicking on 'Tools | Options... | General' tab. 2. Uncheck "Ignore Other Applications". I also know this property can be set in Excel VBA: Application.IgnoreRemoteRequests = False However, there are a LOT of computers that seem to have this problem. I figured that if this is being stored in a registry entry somewhere, I can remotely connect to the user's registry, and set the value to false from there, instead of having to run around to 100+ PC's, and repeat the processes listed here. Any ideas? Thanks! |
#6
Posted to microsoft.public.excel.programming
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Ignore Other Applications" setting
Do you close Excel after changing the setting and re-reading the registry?
Excel writes its setiings when closing. That is, once you change the setting, you need to close Excel so that it is written to the registry. Then, if using RegEdit , refresh the key view. But once again, it is just based on my observation when opening excel, then only changing this single setting, and finally closing excel. -- Regards, Sébastien <http://www.ondemandanalysis.com "Joel" wrote: That was my next question, "What the heck is causing this?" But for now, I'm just trying to see if there is a way I can set this remotely, without disrupting the users, for several hundred users. Again, running around from PC to PC doesn't sound like much fun... You mention it's part of a bitmask...which one? sebasitan3 wrote to check the 7th bit of HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\9.0\Ex cel\Options. I could try HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\E xcel\Options since we're on Office XP here. But, when I change the setting in Excel, I don't notice any change in the registry. Do you have to reboot to see the change or something? Thanks again, Joel "Rob Bovey" wrote: Hi Joel, You can modify the Ignore Other Applications setting directly in the registry. Unfortunately, it's not a simple True/False setting but rather part of a bitmask that stores several settings packed into a single numeric value. Because of this, modifying this setting in the registry correctly is not that much easier than doing it through Excel. My real question is why so many people at your organization have Ignore Other Applications set to True? This is not its default value, but it's very common for badly written Excel VBA applications to turn this setting off when they start up and not turn it back on when they exit. If this is what's going on, then even if you go around and turn it off you're likely to see it back on as soon as everyone has run the problem application again. I'd suggest working with a couple of machines for a while to see if you can narrow down the program that's causing the problem and either get it fixed or get rid of it. -- Rob Bovey, Excel MVP Application Professionals http://www.appspro.com/ * Take your Excel development skills to the next level. * Professional Excel Development http://www.appspro.com/Books/Books.htm "Joel" wrote in message ... Short version: Is there a registry setting for the "Ignore Other Applications" setting? Long version: Many people here have problems opening Excel files that are remedied by: 1. Opening Excel, and clicking on 'Tools | Options... | General' tab. 2. Uncheck "Ignore Other Applications". I also know this property can be set in Excel VBA: Application.IgnoreRemoteRequests = False However, there are a LOT of computers that seem to have this problem. I figured that if this is being stored in a registry entry somewhere, I can remotely connect to the user's registry, and set the value to false from there, instead of having to run around to 100+ PC's, and repeat the processes listed here. Any ideas? Thanks! |
#7
Posted to microsoft.public.excel.programming
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Ignore Other Applications" setting
Ahh... That's why I wasn't catching the registry change with WinDiff ... I
didn't close Excel first! I can find how to set all the option settings through the registry from here. Thanks for your help! : ) "sebastienm" wrote: Do you close Excel after changing the setting and re-reading the registry? Excel writes its setiings when closing. That is, once you change the setting, you need to close Excel so that it is written to the registry. Then, if using RegEdit , refresh the key view. But once again, it is just based on my observation when opening excel, then only changing this single setting, and finally closing excel. -- Regards, Sébastien <http://www.ondemandanalysis.com "Joel" wrote: That was my next question, "What the heck is causing this?" But for now, I'm just trying to see if there is a way I can set this remotely, without disrupting the users, for several hundred users. Again, running around from PC to PC doesn't sound like much fun... You mention it's part of a bitmask...which one? sebasitan3 wrote to check the 7th bit of HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\9.0\Ex cel\Options. I could try HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\E xcel\Options since we're on Office XP here. But, when I change the setting in Excel, I don't notice any change in the registry. Do you have to reboot to see the change or something? Thanks again, Joel "Rob Bovey" wrote: Hi Joel, You can modify the Ignore Other Applications setting directly in the registry. Unfortunately, it's not a simple True/False setting but rather part of a bitmask that stores several settings packed into a single numeric value. Because of this, modifying this setting in the registry correctly is not that much easier than doing it through Excel. My real question is why so many people at your organization have Ignore Other Applications set to True? This is not its default value, but it's very common for badly written Excel VBA applications to turn this setting off when they start up and not turn it back on when they exit. If this is what's going on, then even if you go around and turn it off you're likely to see it back on as soon as everyone has run the problem application again. I'd suggest working with a couple of machines for a while to see if you can narrow down the program that's causing the problem and either get it fixed or get rid of it. -- Rob Bovey, Excel MVP Application Professionals http://www.appspro.com/ * Take your Excel development skills to the next level. * Professional Excel Development http://www.appspro.com/Books/Books.htm "Joel" wrote in message ... Short version: Is there a registry setting for the "Ignore Other Applications" setting? Long version: Many people here have problems opening Excel files that are remedied by: 1. Opening Excel, and clicking on 'Tools | Options... | General' tab. 2. Uncheck "Ignore Other Applications". I also know this property can be set in Excel VBA: Application.IgnoreRemoteRequests = False However, there are a LOT of computers that seem to have this problem. I figured that if this is being stored in a registry entry somewhere, I can remotely connect to the user's registry, and set the value to false from there, instead of having to run around to 100+ PC's, and repeat the processes listed here. Any ideas? Thanks! |
#8
Posted to microsoft.public.excel.programming
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Ignore Other Applications" setting
Hi Joel,
Under the key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\E xcel\Options\ you will see a value called Options. To turn off Ignore Other Applications you need to turn *on* bit 6 of this value. Because the registry doesn't have a binary editor, you have to figure out what value to enter in order to turn this bit on. The easiest way to do this is to perform a bitwise OR operation in the Visual Basic Editor Immediate Window between the decimal number currently in the Option value (the number in parenthesis) and the number 64, which is the decimal representation of a binary number with only the sixth bit set. Lets say the current number in the Options value is 23. In the Immediate Window enter: ? 23 Or 64 87 As you can see, the result is 87. This is the number you need to put back into the Options value in order to turn off Ignore Other Applications. Note that the specific number will likely be different from computer to computer because the Option value holds six settings, so the specific number in it will depend on how the user has Excel configured on their computer. -- Rob Bovey, Excel MVP Application Professionals http://www.appspro.com/ * Take your Excel development skills to the next level. * Professional Excel Development http://www.appspro.com/Books/Books.htm "Joel" wrote in message ... That was my next question, "What the heck is causing this?" But for now, I'm just trying to see if there is a way I can set this remotely, without disrupting the users, for several hundred users. Again, running around from PC to PC doesn't sound like much fun... You mention it's part of a bitmask...which one? sebasitan3 wrote to check the 7th bit of HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\9.0\Ex cel\Options. I could try HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\E xcel\Options since we're on Office XP here. But, when I change the setting in Excel, I don't notice any change in the registry. Do you have to reboot to see the change or something? Thanks again, Joel "Rob Bovey" wrote: Hi Joel, You can modify the Ignore Other Applications setting directly in the registry. Unfortunately, it's not a simple True/False setting but rather part of a bitmask that stores several settings packed into a single numeric value. Because of this, modifying this setting in the registry correctly is not that much easier than doing it through Excel. My real question is why so many people at your organization have Ignore Other Applications set to True? This is not its default value, but it's very common for badly written Excel VBA applications to turn this setting off when they start up and not turn it back on when they exit. If this is what's going on, then even if you go around and turn it off you're likely to see it back on as soon as everyone has run the problem application again. I'd suggest working with a couple of machines for a while to see if you can narrow down the program that's causing the problem and either get it fixed or get rid of it. -- Rob Bovey, Excel MVP Application Professionals http://www.appspro.com/ * Take your Excel development skills to the next level. * Professional Excel Development http://www.appspro.com/Books/Books.htm "Joel" wrote in message ... Short version: Is there a registry setting for the "Ignore Other Applications" setting? Long version: Many people here have problems opening Excel files that are remedied by: 1. Opening Excel, and clicking on 'Tools | Options... | General' tab. 2. Uncheck "Ignore Other Applications". I also know this property can be set in Excel VBA: Application.IgnoreRemoteRequests = False However, there are a LOT of computers that seem to have this problem. I figured that if this is being stored in a registry entry somewhere, I can remotely connect to the user's registry, and set the value to false from there, instead of having to run around to 100+ PC's, and repeat the processes listed here. Any ideas? Thanks! |
#9
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Ignore Other Applications" setting
For anyone still following this thread, here's what I came up with...
I entered the following into Notepad, and saved it as an .INF file ( I called it "ExcelFilesWontOpenFix.inf" ): -------------------------------------------------- [Version] Signature=$CHICAGO$ [DefaultInstall] BitReg=Bit.Settings [Bit.Settings] HKCU,Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\Excel\Options, Options,0x00000001,0x40,0 ------------------------------------------------------- Then to run the file, I use the following vbscript: ------------------------------------------------------- Dim WshShell, oExec, strCommandLine strCommandLine = "rundll32.exe setupapi,InstallHinfSection DefaultInstall 132 \\MyServer\MyFolder\ExcelFilesWontOpenFix.inf" Set WshShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell") Set oExec = WshShell.Exec(strCommandLine ) MsgBox "Excel repaired!" ------------------------------------------------------- ....of course, replacing '\\MyServer\MyFolder\' with either the PC folder or network location as required. I had our users run this from a network location, saving them a few clicks. This is the command line that Windows XP associates with installing the .INF file extension in the registry. And, if you haven't bought the "Microsoft Windows XP Registry Guide" by Jerry Honeycutt (ISBN 0-7356-1788-0), I strongly recommend it, giving credit for this fix where credit is due! Thanks to all of you for all of your help as well! Joel "Joel" wrote: Ahh... That's why I wasn't catching the registry change with WinDiff ... I didn't close Excel first! I can find how to set all the option settings through the registry from here. Thanks for your help! : ) "sebastienm" wrote: Do you close Excel after changing the setting and re-reading the registry? Excel writes its setiings when closing. That is, once you change the setting, you need to close Excel so that it is written to the registry. Then, if using RegEdit , refresh the key view. But once again, it is just based on my observation when opening excel, then only changing this single setting, and finally closing excel. -- Regards, Sébastien <http://www.ondemandanalysis.com "Joel" wrote: That was my next question, "What the heck is causing this?" But for now, I'm just trying to see if there is a way I can set this remotely, without disrupting the users, for several hundred users. Again, running around from PC to PC doesn't sound like much fun... You mention it's part of a bitmask...which one? sebasitan3 wrote to check the 7th bit of HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\9.0\Ex cel\Options. I could try HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\E xcel\Options since we're on Office XP here. But, when I change the setting in Excel, I don't notice any change in the registry. Do you have to reboot to see the change or something? Thanks again, Joel "Rob Bovey" wrote: Hi Joel, You can modify the Ignore Other Applications setting directly in the registry. Unfortunately, it's not a simple True/False setting but rather part of a bitmask that stores several settings packed into a single numeric value. Because of this, modifying this setting in the registry correctly is not that much easier than doing it through Excel. My real question is why so many people at your organization have Ignore Other Applications set to True? This is not its default value, but it's very common for badly written Excel VBA applications to turn this setting off when they start up and not turn it back on when they exit. If this is what's going on, then even if you go around and turn it off you're likely to see it back on as soon as everyone has run the problem application again. I'd suggest working with a couple of machines for a while to see if you can narrow down the program that's causing the problem and either get it fixed or get rid of it. -- Rob Bovey, Excel MVP Application Professionals http://www.appspro.com/ * Take your Excel development skills to the next level. * Professional Excel Development http://www.appspro.com/Books/Books.htm "Joel" wrote in message ... Short version: Is there a registry setting for the "Ignore Other Applications" setting? Long version: Many people here have problems opening Excel files that are remedied by: 1. Opening Excel, and clicking on 'Tools | Options... | General' tab. 2. Uncheck "Ignore Other Applications". I also know this property can be set in Excel VBA: Application.IgnoreRemoteRequests = False However, there are a LOT of computers that seem to have this problem. I figured that if this is being stored in a registry entry somewhere, I can remotely connect to the user's registry, and set the value to false from there, instead of having to run around to 100+ PC's, and repeat the processes listed here. Any ideas? Thanks! |
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