Chinese excel documents

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  1. #1

    Join Date
    Jan 2006
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    Fo Tan
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    Chinese excel documents

    Anyone know why my US Dell with a 2 year old version of Microsoft Excel would not recognize an excel document from a Chinese version of Office 2007? The Chinese version--I believe--was purchased from Dell China.
    When I try to open the document I get "Unable to Invoke Program", whatever that means. Also, my excel documnets are .xls, this one of the Chinese version is .xlsx.
    F


  2. #2

    Join Date
    May 2005
    Location
    Hong Kong, from UK
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    3,838

    Congratulations - you've hit on the business model which made Bill Gates the richest man in the world.*

    Microsoft make a habit out of changing their file formats in every new version of their software, so that their upgrade revenues grow virally - in order to open the Office 2007 file, you have to have a copy of Office 2007. The Office 200X version you have from a year or two back will not open the file.
    [*] Yes, alright, he's been doing good stuff with the money recently, but that doesn't change the dodgy way it was obtained.