Unable to open Excel file with Excel or OpenOffice

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Ron S - 28 Jun 2008 14:07 GMT

Good morning everyone,

I am hoping that someone can give me a hand. Recently I downloaded a
file that is work related, when I attempt to open this file with the
Microsoft 2003 Excel viewer I receive the following error: "Microsoft
Excel viewer cannot open files of this type". When I attempt to open
the same file with Microsoft 2007 Excel viewer I receive two errors,
the first says that the viewer can not find the file the I am trying
to open, the second error is the same as Microsoft 2003 viewer.

I have also tried opening the file with OpenOffice 2.4 and all that I
get is a text import screen with several options available -- no
matter which option I choose I get a spreadsheet with 54,000 lines of
code.

Does anyone have ideas?

Thanks in advance...

Ron

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Ron S - 28 Jun 2008 14:18 GMT

Update...

If it helps, I tried downloading an excel template from Microsoft and
was able to open it with both excel and Open Office. Could it be that
the file that I am attempting open if corrupt?

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ShaneDevenshire - 28 Jun 2008 15:16 GMT

Hi Ron,

It sounds like the file is corrupt or not really the filetype it appears to
be. Test this by creating a small Excel file and try opening it using both
viewers. If it works but your's doesn't it suggests there is a problem with
your file. Can you open your file in Excel 2003 or 2007 programs, not
viewers? What is the files extension?

Signature

Cheers,
Shane Devenshire

> Update...
>
> If it helps, I tried downloading an excel template from Microsoft and
> was able to open it with both excel and Open Office. Could it be that
> the file that I am attempting open if corrupt?

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Bruce Sinclair - 30 Jun 2008 05:46 GMT

>Hi Ron,
>
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
>your file. Can you open your file in Excel 2003 or 2007 programs, not
>viewers? What is the files extension?

Yes, be aware that XL thinks that anything called <something>.xls (or xlsx
for 2007 IIRC ?) is an XL file. As we know, this is not always the case. :)
It might not be an xl file at all. :)

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