Word 2003 scroll bars frozen

[Charles Waudby]

We have a VS2005 application that automates Word 2003 to do a mailmerge. On
the customer's PCs, after the merge, the horizontal and vertical scroll bars
are frozen (not greyed out). Not only the merge document, but all other
documents open before and after AND emails in Outlook. The customer is
running the same version as we are, ie SP2 (although here we checked and it
is also OK in SP1).

The application creates other documents that are not mail merges and this
does not occur.

Only by closing Word (and Outlook) does the problem cease until the next
mail merge.

Any ideas?

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi =?Utf-8?B?Q2hhcmxlcyBXYXVkYnk=?=,

Only the scroll bars? Or is the application completely locked?

Lots of weird problems have cropped up with SP2. Check that the client has
installed all the same hotfixes as on your installation.

We have a VS2005 application that automates Word 2003 to do a mailmerge. On
the customer's PCs, after the merge, the horizontal and vertical scroll bars
are frozen (not greyed out). Not only the merge document, but all other
documents open before and after AND emails in Outlook. The customer is
running the same version as we are, ie SP2 (although here we checked and it
is also OK in SP1).

The application creates other documents that are not mail merges and this
does not occur.

Only by closing Word (and Outlook) does the problem cease until the next
mail merge.

Any ideas?

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Jun 17 2005)
http://www.word.mvps.org

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[Charles Waudby]

Only the scroll bars are frozen - nothing else is affected.

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi Charles,

Only the scroll bars are frozen - nothing else is affected.

And you're checking whether the client has installed the same hotfixes as you?
I was at a client the other week that had a different set of hotfixes than a
developer (also 2003 SP2) and there was a problem due to that.

The next thing I'd check would be how a UI mail merge does, with a manual link
to the same data source your app uses. And with one of the documents (or
templates) the app uses. Just to compare the behavior.

Has the client told you on how many PCs this is happening? Sometimes they say
"all" when it's really only on one or two. Because if the scroll bars aren't
working I'd also check for a damaged graphics card driver.

Beyond that, could you show us the code that deals with mail merge?

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Jun 17 2005)
http://www.word.mvps.org

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[Charles Waudby]

Hi,

At the moment this is new and only about 4 PCs are installed, of those which
are as mixture of WXP and W2K, but all with Office 2003, all exhibit the
problem with the customer, none do here.

The rest of the program creates Word documents and populates them via
automation, but not as merges, and the problem does not occur.

The code for this element is attached. The only obvious difference between
the merge and the non-merge is that with the merge we create the merged
document in a visible instance of Word whereas we create all the other
documents in a hidden instance of Word, save it and then open the completed
document in the User's instance if running or in a new visible instance (as
the merge does for the data source document).

We have had other "environmental" issues at the site, eg they had a script
running at logon which was supposed to check the user's international
settings and set sPositivesign to blank - but only managed to set it to an
invalid value, probably NULL. This causes string to integer conversion in
VS2005 to fail. But I have not tracked anything similar for Office/Word.

Regards,

Charles

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi Charles,

The code for this element is attached.

Thanks for that. I see a number of potential problems, but
the one that stands out:

1067: oUserWord.Visible = True

The problem you describe can occur if you pick up a Word
application object, work with it, make it visible... and
don't activate it. Been a while since I've seen this come
up, possbibly because most programmers these days use New
Word.application instead of CreateObject.

It also makes a difference in which order you use Visible
and Activate. I think it has to be in that order, and not
Activate then Visible. Try putting Activate in there and
see if that helps.

You might also make sure you consistently set all objects
to Nothing. You don't set the data document to Nothing,
although you do set the applciation object you were working
with to nothing.

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update
Jun 17 2005)
http://www.word.mvps.org

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follow question or reply in the newsgroup and not by e-mail

 

[Charles Waudby]

Thanks, will try it and see what happens (cusotmer lead on holiday this week
so will be next week).

Question though, it does not happen on PCs in this office . . . ?

Thanks for your feedback

Charles.

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi Charles,

Question though, it does not happen on PCs in this office . . . ?

I can't remember any details, I'm afraid. If it's what I think
(which still isn't certain), it has something to do with OLE
management on the system. Similar problems are known to crop up
when loading Word as an embedded object in some programs...

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Jun 17
2005)
http://www.word.mvps.org

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question or reply in the newsgroup and not by e-mail

 

[Charles Waudby]

Made the change as suggested but it had no effect.

Will change the app to create the merged document and save it then open the
saved copy in the user's instance of Word.

I think the issue here is between all our devt and test PCs which do not
exhibit the problem and all the customer PCs which do - something else they
have installed is my current guess.

Will post the outcome in due course.

Thanks for your posts.

Charles Waudby

 

[Peter Huang [MSFT]]

Hi Charles,

First of all, I would like to summarize the issue.
From your description, I understand that you will do mailmerge via
automation in VB.NET.
The instance that do word mail merge will be visible and the other
instances that opened the document will be invisible. This occurred on
Customer's PC(Word 2003 with SP2 installed, but not at your machine).
After mailmerge(in which exactly steps?), the scrollbar in all the word
instance will freeze.

Common I agree with Cindy's suggestion and troubleshooting steps, you may
also follow up in that thread, I will monitor it.
From your description, it seems that the scenario may be complex that when
you do mail merge that there may be other word instances running.
e.g. the instance open the document and the instance run by outlook.

I understand that this did not occur at your dev machine. But to isolate
the problem, I suggest you did not running any other instance including the
one used by outlook.
Now there is no winword.exe in memory, and we not run the program to
automation word to do mailmerge, did the problem occur? In which exactly
steps?
Also Cindy may have suggest that you may try to do the same job that
mailmerge manually, i.e. by click the menu to do that, is there any
different?

Also you may check if the customer's machine running the same environment
as your dev machine.
e.g. the exactly Word version, Help/Abou Microsoft Office Word
the .NET framework version that is using by your VB.NET application.
is the PIA 2003 installed on customer's machine.


Best regards,

Peter Huang

Microsoft Online Community Support
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[Charles Waudby]

Hi and thanks for the input.

To clarify, even with no other application open, run our software for the
mailmerge and it uses a hidden instance of Word to create the datasource (a
table in a document from Normal.dot). Then we pickup any running instance or
if not exists open one. Do the merge into an exisitng template and activate.
Scroll bars are frozen in this and all subsequent instances of Word and
Outlook until Word/Outlook are closed.

The frozen scroll bars problem exists on all the user PCs installed so far
(WinXP and Win2K and Office 2003 SP2) but none of ours which includes WinXP
and Win2K and Office 2003 SP1 and SP2.

We suspect a conflict with other software. The user has 5 new PCs installed
last week and we will test those tihs week to see what we learn,

Will advise

Charles

 

[Peter Huang [MSFT]]

Hi Charles.

Thanks for your input and clarification.

I look forward to any new update from you.

Also another simple test you may try is that run the PC in SafeMode and run
the Application to see if the problem occur.
Or
An antivirus software may be the cause based on my experience.


Best regards,

Peter Huang

Microsoft Online Community Support
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[Peter Huang [MSFT]]

Hi Charles,

How is the things going?
If you have any concern, please feel free to post here.


Best regards,

Peter Huang

Microsoft Online Community Support
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[Charles Waudby]

We have re-written the part of the program that does the mail merge so that
the entire process is completed in the hidden instance of Word and then the
new merge document is saved - this saved document is then opened in any
existing visible instance of Word or a new visible instance is instantiated
(this is how all the other parts of the software work, but we did not want
to save the merge documents as they are only for printing and do not need
saving).

In this case, there is no problem with the scroll bars.

We are waiting for the local IT department to apply Office SP2 to 5 new PCs
to test the original software with cleanly installed PCs. Will advise on
progress.

Regards,

Charles

 

[Peter Huang [MSFT]]

Hi Charles,

Thanks for your experience sharing in the community.
Also since your alternative solution works and you do not want the temp
file saved, you may try to delete it after certain time, e.g.
Document.Closed event or other chance after you did not want to use the
file again.

If you have any concern, please feel free to post here.

Best regards,

Peter Huang

Microsoft Online Community Support
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that others may learn and benefit from your issue.
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