Compatibility issue? Excel97/2003

[HBj]

I've developed an application in Excel97 with a small set of VBA macros and
I update the sheets daily.

A couple of times I updated the sheets in Excel2003, successfully run the
macros and saved the file. After the handling in Excel2003 it is no more
possible to save the file in Excel97 without the message
"this file was created using a later version of Microsoft Excel ".

I have in Excel97 recreated the file by
- copying the worksheets from original file to a new Excel97 Workbook and
- Copied all macros via a notepad-file to the new Excel97 VBA module.

Now, I can successfully update worksheets and run the macros and save the
file without the message, but

as soon as I reopen the new file and accept the question if I want to enable
macros, the same message comes up when I try to save the file.

The macros are originally written in Excel 97 - no change has been made to
those macros in Excel2003. They run successfully in both Excel versions.

Doesn't anybody out there know what is/are different between those versions?
It appears that only when the file includes macros, the incompatibility
issue appears.
But all macros are source of Excel97???

 

[Don Guillett]

Perhaps you are saving as "excel 97,etc" instead of just saving as if it
were to be used in 2003?

 

[Tom Ogilvy]

Excel 2002/2003 have a more sophisticated security model than Excel 97. I
suspect when you enable macros, some default settings are made and then
recorded in the file when you save it. While the fileformats are
compatible, excel 97 discards information it does not understand and thus
the prompt.

That would be my guess.

 

[HBj]

In other words,
Excel 97 and Excel 2003 are _not_ compatible.
So, what can be done? Do not use same app in 97 and 2003?
What are the security settings? Can they be checked?

Håkan

 

[Tom Ogilvy]

You have shown that they are compatible. The question was why the message -
I gave my best guess.

I assume the question really is how can I operate between 97 and 2003 and
eliminate the message as well. I don't have an answer for you on that.