[Solved, Sort of] OpenOffice Dies With Tiny Little Dialog

[No_Closed_Office]

Hello,

I have been running OpenOffice for several years now on this PC and have had no problems on it. Recently (as in the past 24 hours), when any OpenOffice application starts, I get a tiny window that has nothing in it but an "OK" button. The title of the Dialog is "OpenOffice.org" (see attached file). If I "Run As.." with an administrator account, or log in as an administrator, I have no problems using OpenOffice.

I reinstalled OpenOffice (no JRE) but that did not help. I uninstalled and installed with the JRE but that did not help, also.

The only software I installed in the past 24 hours (that I am aware of) was TaxCut Premium Federal.

I have OpenOffice running on two other computers in my house under non-admin and with the same antivirus software.

Anyone have any ideas?

Thank you,

Bob

Some specifics:
OpenOffice 2.3.1
Windows XP Home
JRE: Java 1.6 Update 3
AntiVirus: AVG Free

[acknak]

I have been running OpenOffice for several years now on this PC and have had no problems on it. ... If I "Run As.." with an administrator account, or log in as an administrator, I have no problems using OpenOffice.

That's a dead giveaway that your user settings are corrupt. OOo has a nasty habit of doing that for some reason.

You can rename or remove your configuration folder and OOo will create a new one for you.

The default locations are:
Windows: \Documents and settings\user\Application data\Openoffice.org2
Linux: ~/.openoffice.org2

[No_Closed_Office]

I renamed the OpenOffice.org2 folder to OpenOffice.org2.bad, then started OpenOffice. I saw it create a new OpenOffice.org2 folder, then die with the same tiny little dialog.

[Hagar Delest]

Check the rights for the OOo user profile and its subfolders perhaps.
I don't think a registry cleaning would improve anything but who knows?

[No_Closed_Office]

I can try uninstalling then cleaning the registry. Do you know which registry keys (and what hives they are in) I should delete? Also, is there an official list somewhere of these keys?

Better yet, is there a way to turn on logging so I can see why it is dying?

Thanks.

[Hagar Delest]

No idea about the keys, I guess there are not so few.
For the log, I know how to do that under Linux but not under Windows.

[foxcole]

Check the rights for the OOo user profile and its subfolders perhaps.

I've seen this question pop up a lot lately, mainly with Vista users, and so far the problem has always been due to the user profile security settings on the computer. You have to be logged in to an administrator account, evidently, to use OOo.

I'm not sure if it's always been that way, but it seems like a bad idea. I wouldn't want to give someone full admin rights on a computer just so they could use an office suite! Too risky.

[Hagar Delest]

You have to be logged in to an administrator account, evidently, to use OOo.

I'm not sure if it's always been that way, but it seems like a bad idea. I wouldn't want to give someone full admin rights on a computer just so they could use an office suite! Too risky.

+1.
however, tt may be just a problem of rights on the folders.
But I agree there is a problem with Vista. According to comments from colleagues, it just can't stop asking you if you're sure to do what you're doing. Quite irritating.
Windows has always been messy in its rights management. Not enough and you can't do anything, too much and you're so vulnerable.

[No_Closed_Office]

OK, I just returned from the Twilight Zone (Windows XP Home file permissions).

Just to recap:

• 1. For some reason. OpenOffice 2.3 stopped working on all accounts, except for "Owner" (aka Administrator for XP Home on HP machines).
• 2. I could get it to work when I did a "Run As..." from an account that was not Owner

Here's the latest:

• 1. I made one of the non-Owner accounts an Administrator Account
• 2. Logged in, but still could not run OpenOffice
• 3. Deleted the Application Data\OpenOffice.org2 directory, but this did not work
• 4. Enabled Log4j logging on Owner, but this did not show anything useful in the logs.
• 5. Enabled Log4j on non-Owner account. Since the Tools->Options->OpenOfficeorg->Java->Class Path... dialog is not available, I had to directly fiddle with the config files. Log4j did not even start.
• 6. Noticed that I got an "Access Denied" when I tried to look in C:\Program Files from the non-Owner account, even though it was an Administrator Account. Oddly, all programs that were installed under C:\Program Files were working just fine. Evidently, under Windows XP Home there must be three types of accounts:
  A. Limited Account
  B. Administrator Account
  C. I Really Mean It - Administrator Account
  Unfortunately, I did not know the secret handshake to enable the type "C" account for someone other than Owner. If this were SELinux, I would use audit2why and audit2allow to build a policy, or use one of the nifty graphical utilities that come for free with Linux. Not only that, I would most likely get a console message, too. If this were XP Pro or XP MCE, I would change the permissions. But no, this is Windows XP Home.
• 7. I uninstalled OpenOffice
• 8. I re-installed OpenOffice, but this time put the installation files in the root directory of C: and installed it to C:\OpenOffice 2.3 rather than C:\Program Files\OpenOffice 2.3.
• 9. It worked for all accounts.
• 10. I rebooted.
• 11. It still worked for all accounts, Owner and non-Owner, Administrator Accounts and Limited Accounts.

I believe there is some way to change the extended permissions under XP Home, but I am too tired to look right now.

I hope this can be of use to you.

[Hagar Delest]

Thanks for such investigation!

I'm sure it will help other users, this rights issue is quite frequent!