Genealogy Chat

Can anyone help, I received the recent Excel Spreadsheet but it wouldn't download, I have Excel 2003 and it was Office 2000, asked Paul but he didn't know why it wouldn't download. It kept asking me to insert a disk. Can anyone help with this, have been in touch with others who are also having download problems. Will I have to dowload Office 2000 or what. HELP!!!!!!

Complicated story, but I lost Microsoft Excel on my computer. Someone has just given me a disk to re-install it, but this needs a password /user number(which I have) - I am just wondering if its maybe something to do with you not having a Registered User number? Olde Crone

Hi olde Crone I downloaded Microsoft excel 2003 to enable me to get this spreadsheet, somehow when I received spreadsheet it wont dowload.

Hi Peter I have Excel 2003 but when I open it comes up Excel 2003 quickly followed by My documents. It then says' file name' ????? Files of type M'Soft Office Excel files. I'm afraid I don't understand and I would love Paul's spreadsheet. Can you advise please? Jill

Hi Peter a lot of people are in the same boat. We all wanted the Spreadsheet. From the start ok. I received e-mail with Spreadsheet as attachment, prior to this I dowloaded Microsoft Excel 2003 from free download page of Mircrosoft.. It stated download completed, I then tried to download spreadsheet but each time I tried a message came up saying disk required and wouldn't dowload excel at all. Several people in same boat. Why has this happened, please don't be to technical here or we won't understand ok. Sorry forgot to add I opened the Excel and I do have a viewer.

Peter - butting in here in your conversation with Betty. Paul's spreadsheet was supposed to be as an attachment but there was no little 'thingy' to say there was an attachment! At that time I hadn't Excel 2003 - and now I have I don't know what to do with the d**n thing! Jill

Well Peter I did get an attachment with the e-mails and this is the problem it wont open to Excel. It won't download.

Hi Folks I'd love to work this out tonight but I'm cream crackered! Will look at the boards tomorrow to see if there's anything helpful. PAUL YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'VE STARTED!!! lol. Jill

Peter did you receive the e-mail and attachment spreadsheet i sent ? let me know if you could open it ok!

SORRY EVERYONE IF THERE IS A DELAY IN MY REPLYING TO YOUR MESSAGES. I AM ALSO RECEIVING E-MAIL VIA GENES REUNITED TO MY OWN MESSAGES SECTION AND HAVE TO REPLY TO THEM TOO.

Jill if you would like me to send you Pauls e-mail, mine does have an attachment just contact me with your e-mail address ok. I will send it a.s.a.p.

Excel: In order to see the Spreadsheet you need Microsoft Office installed. Microsoft Office consists of Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook (not Outlook Express). It sometimes also has Publisher and Access. It depends which version of Office you have; but the more you spend the more you get. For anyone who has downloaded the free viewer, I can't see how this will be much good, since it will only allow you to view the spreadsheet, you won't be able to alter it or edit it in any way. Microsoft Office is an expensive piece of kit so unless you can get the Microsoft Works spreadsheet to open the attachment you are knackered! If I make a spreadsheet in Works I can convert it to an Excel Spreadsheet; but I don't know if it works the other way round. Basically, Works and Office although made by Microsoft, are two entirely different pieces of kit. Works is basically the Poor Man's version of Microsoft Office. Cheers, Horatia PS I am going to try and open the Excel Spreadsheet with Works. I've decided not to do this in case I muck my settings up!

I have found the Windows versions of Works to be incompatible with Excel. Works version 2 (DOS version) will open in Excel, but Works 3 and 4 won't. Very annoying!

Perhaps the easiest way round this is to see if something similar could be produced in the Works Spreadsheet and let those who have Works rather than Office download that instead? Cheers, Horatia

Well I have Given up on this, after trying about a hundred times and various people e-mailing me with the same problem I thought maybe just maybe we could get it done and dusted tonight . With the great help of Peter, Jill and everone else I still can't solve the problem. I have Microsoft Excel and also have Microsoft Office and I have Excel viewer but nothing is coming together. I hope everyone else has managed to complete this saga but I no longer care. I can live quite well without it. THANKS TO EVERYONE FOR THEIR HELP, E-MAILS AND ASSISTANCE.

I have come across many people who think they have Microsoft Office when they actually have Microsoft Works. The two programmes look remarkably similar. I suspect this is the reason many people are having problems but without seeing people's computer's it is difficult to say. A test would be this. Open up your spreadsheet programme and do a 'Save As' and look at the file type it is going to save the file as. If it says .xls you have Excel (Microsoft Office). If it says .xlr you have Works not Office. Hope this helps. Cheers, Horatia PS You don't need the free viewer if you have Excel already installed. Most PCs come preinstalled with Works rather than Office. However, some PC manufacturers will ask if you would like to have Office as an optional extra, but it usually costs more money to have it.

I haven't got the spreadsheet in question, but there is a way to convert an Excel file to a Works file. It must be done on a PC with both Excel and Works installed though. Note that you will lose any functionality on the spreadsheet that is Excel-specific (i.e. that is not also supported in Works). This from the Microsoft Help & Support website: http://support.microsoft*com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;q102387 Works: Converting an Excel Spreadsheet to a Works Database 1. In the Excel spreadsheet, select the data you want to transfer and choose Set Database from the Data menu. 2. From the File menu, choose Save As. 3. Enter a new name for the file, specify the directory in which you want the file saved (for example, C:\MSWORKS) and choose DBF 3 or DBF 4 from the Save File As Type box. 4. Exit Excel and open Works for Windows. 5. From the File menu, choose Open Existing File. 6. Change to the directory where the file is located, type *.DBF in the File Name box, and press ENTER. 7. Select the file and choose OK. Works for Windows will convert the file automatically to the Works for Windows database format.

Hi Richard, It's good to know this and thanks for the instructions. I like to know if these things can be done or not. Sadly it won't help those who don't have Excel on their PC. Cheers, Horatia

I downloaded the spreadsheet from Paul some months ago...in fact I think I may have started all this by asking if anyone had this programme. It loaded just fine and I had no problem downloading my gedcom to it.....I have had trouble trying to work out how to update the files. ..managed it evetually but don't ask me how !! It's a great programme for 'see at a glance' records though rather than trawling through your tree programme good luck, Sylvia

If you download excel I think it is just a reader and it is not editable. Try googling for easy office. This is free for personal use