Excel2003 annoying ActiveX and trusted source pop-up

Tom Urtis

MrExcel MVP
Joined
Feb 10, 2002
Messages
11,300
Hi everyone,

Last week I installed MS Office Professional Edition 2003. Even though I already had Office 2002, I did a complete install (as opposed to the Upgrade option at installation) . My O/S is Windows XP.

Since then, when I open and save an Excel application that contains VBA or controls, as most of mine do, an annoying message box appears, with "Microsoft forms" in the title bar, the vbExclamation icon, and two buttons labeled OK and Cancel.

The text of the message is:
"This application is about to initialize ActiveX controls that might be unsafe. If you trust the source of this file, select OK and the controls will be initialized using your current workspace settings."

I have done numerous searches on Google and did everything anyone had been advised to do that was experiencing this same problem. I also went to this KB link
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;827742
and followed the directions by setting the UFI control to 1 for each of the 3 registry keys listed on that page. One of the 3 key paths was incorrect
(HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Office\Common) in that on my system at least, there was no "Office\Common" path continuation, so I created one and still set the UFI to 1 there. No luck.

This is not because of spyware. I am positive my system does not have a virus.

Nothing I've tried has worked. I guess Office 2003 is still too new whereby there is not abundant information on how to fix this annoying pop-up for files that contain VBA or ActiveX controls.

Has anyone experienced this and successfully fixed it? If so, how did you fix it?

Thanks for any info or tips.
 

Excel Facts

When they said...
When they said you are going to "Excel at life", they meant you "will be doing Excel your whole life".
Have you checked the macro security settings? The trusted sources is a 'new' option on the security settings - and you can 'tick' trust all sources.

EDIT - just realised who I was posting to :oops: sure you checked that already.
 
Upvote 0
Andrew, thank you for that suggestion, and no I had not tried that, until today when you posted the suggestion. Unfortunately, it did not stop the pop-ups that I described here, but it did solve other issues I was having with 2003, so at least I'm better off today than I was yesterday. Thanks again.

lasw10 - - Yes, I had thought of your idea beforehand but that did not turn out to be the cause...thanks anyway though.

By the way, this is not a pop-up where setting the DisplayAlerts to False does any good.

That still leaves this original pop-up issue unsolved. If I come across a fix I'll post it, and in the meantime, any and all suggestions are certainly welcome.
 
Upvote 0
Hi Tom,

almost one year has passed since you have posted your problems with that ActiveX-pop-ups. I wonder if you have finally found a solution?
Got the same problems would be happy to get some information about the solution.

Thanks, Judith
 
Upvote 0
After I posted that, the problem went away one week later. Since then I've received maybe a half-dozen emails or PMs from other people who are experiencing the same thing, and asking me how I got rid of it.

I wish I could give you a solid answer, but I honestly don't know how or why it stopped. I reinstalled XP, did a virus scan (no viruses), did a spyware scan, rebooted a few times, said a few medieval incantations while waving a garlic necklace over my computer (not really), and I never saw it again after that.

I cannot say that those steps were what fixed the problem, maybe it was something else that happened which I was not aware of. Unfortunately, I cannot recommend anything more than the witchcraft techniques I attempted, until something (whatever it was) made the annoying message prompt go away.

Good luck.
 
Upvote 0
I'm bummed because I am experiencing the same issue... I am running Office XP/2002, not 2003, so the referenced solution does not apply. I sure hope some other expert has a solution to this problem. It's very annoying.
 
Upvote 0
A shot in the dark but if Tom added a Reg key then uninstalled office I believe the new key is retained. So re-installing office will retain this key then it suddenly works. If this is true then perhaps simply unregistering office, making changes recommended to the registry then re-registering office may be the way to go.

To unregister select Start|Run then enter like this below amending the path as required...
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office\EXCEL.EXE" /unregserver

To register again...
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office\EXCEL.EXE" /regserver

I would be interested to know if this worked.
 
Upvote 0
Hello everyone - -

I received an email today from a non-board member who saw this thread and had the same problem. He said he fixed the problem for himself, here is what he wrote:


Start quote:

Tom,

This thread from MrExcel Message Board came up on a Google search. In your last entry you mentioned that somehow you got the problem fixed, but didn't know exactly what did it. Your post gave me hope that I would find the answer and I did....

I had been trying the Microsoft article 827742, as referenced in the thread. The first part discusses the UFIControls entry in the registry. This seemed to do nothing for me - even trying all three referenced places where the entry might need to be created. Finally I decided to try the "Forms3 and ActiveX initialization" portion of 827742 - which I thought would have nothing to do with my problem. I created the key\value and Bingo.... the annoying message that was happening during File\Save went away.

...Since you said that multiple folks had been writing asking about your solution, I thought I'd pass my success along to you.

End Quote


How about that...cool. I replied and thanked him, so maybe this is another avenue someone can take if they have the same problem and all else has failed.

Gotta love the net.
 
Upvote 0
Today is the day for emails I guess, and another valuable one I received from a reader who said he solved this problem for himself on his Office XP system.

He said the solution he used can also be found at this link:
http://e-s.kirschke.bei.t-online.de/wd11.htm

I assume he was referring specifically to this tip:
http://e-s.kirschke.bei.t-online.de/wd11.htm#20


The first thing you'll notice is, it's in German, but you can translate the essence of it on a free site like babel fish:
http://babelfish.altavista.com/babelfish/tr
 
Upvote 0

Forum statistics

Threads
1,214,791
Messages
6,121,611
Members
449,038
Latest member
apwr

We've detected that you are using an adblocker.

We have a great community of people providing Excel help here, but the hosting costs are enormous. You can help keep this site running by allowing ads on MrExcel.com.
Allow Ads at MrExcel

Which adblocker are you using?

Disable AdBlock

Follow these easy steps to disable AdBlock

1)Click on the icon in the browser’s toolbar.
2)Click on the icon in the browser’s toolbar.
2)Click on the "Pause on this site" option.
Go back

Disable AdBlock Plus

Follow these easy steps to disable AdBlock Plus

1)Click on the icon in the browser’s toolbar.
2)Click on the toggle to disable it for "mrexcel.com".
Go back

Disable uBlock Origin

Follow these easy steps to disable uBlock Origin

1)Click on the icon in the browser’s toolbar.
2)Click on the "Power" button.
3)Click on the "Refresh" button.
Go back

Disable uBlock

Follow these easy steps to disable uBlock

1)Click on the icon in the browser’s toolbar.
2)Click on the "Power" button.
3)Click on the "Refresh" button.
Go back
Back
Top