[Solved] IE wont open office files from OWA with Open Office

[nho3]

The company I work for is using Open Office on user computers. These computer access the internet thorugh MS windows IE6 or IE7. They pretty much don't do anything except access the web and webmail. Sometimes they need to open office documents from their e-mail. On certain computers we have found that the user's don't have an open button when clicking on an attachment. After two days on the phone with microsoft support we discovered the problem is cause by OpenOffice. Does anybody know why this is happening? It appears as though the file type registration for OpenOffice in windows gets corrupted and IE doesn't know what program to use to open the documents. Reinstalling OpenOffice does not help.

[Bhikkhu Pesala]

Please read the Survival Guide to the Forum.

Use a meaningful title to your post. Nearly everyone who posts here needs help.

When OpenOffice is installed, there is an option to choose whether or not DOC files should be associate with the program. If that option was chosen, then they will no longer open with Word. To fix the file associations, right-click on a DOC file in Windows Explorer, select “Open With” and Choose Program. Select MS Word, and “Always use the select program to open files of this type.”

MS Support gave you misleading information. This problem is not caused by OpenOffice, but by user error. The file association has not been corrupted — it was changed by whoever installed Open Office, whether knowingly or unknowingly. The relevant dialogue box in the Setup program is very clear, and DOC files are not associated by default. One has to click a checkbox to make the association.

[nho3]

The file associations are set correctly. When files are opened in windows they open with OpenOffice but when opening them from links within Outlook Web Access IE treats it as a file with no program accosiated.

[nho3]

I managed to fix the problem. I installed the S/MIME control in OWA and that fixed it.