Office Watson

[Brian]

What is Office Watson?
When I am in Outlook Express and click on a link to a web
site from an email message and go to the site.
Then I exit Internet Explorer.
The next time I start I.E. It will not load then I do
ctrl alt del then choose end program it says the running
program is Office Watson.
In order to get I.E. to work I must reboot then it runs
I.E.OK.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

 

[SA]

Brian:

Office Watson is a tool included in Microsoft Office 2002 and later, that,
when one of the Office applications crashes or otherwise has a fault, it
captures information about that fault and what might have caused the crash
and then creates a report and offers to send it to MS. MS uses this
information to enhance the reliability of their products (and it is useful.)

The following KB article describes what is occuring with Office Watson and
MS' privacy policy related to the information:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;283768

The following KB article describes how to disable Office Watson should you
wish to do so (although not recommended.)

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;325075

In addition, if you are running Windows Xp, you can disable application
error reporting in general by opening the system control panel and on the
Advanced Tab click the "Error Reporting" button at the bottom.

Related to the lock up itself, you could try setting Internet Explorer to
not reuse Windows (Internet control panel, advanced tab). And see if that
helps at all.

Steve Arbaugh
MS Access MVP