PC Win: MS Word Attachments Open Multiple Copies of Program

• Microsoft Mail for Windows, versions 3.0, 3.0b, 3.2, and 3.2a

SYMPTOMS

When you open Mail attachments using Microsoft Word version 6.0 for Windows, Word may open multiple instances of itself. This behavior can potentially create resource problems in Microsoft Windows.

CAUSE

Microsoft Word 6.0 for Windows normally allows for multiple documents to be open in one instance of the program. For this to occur, the documents must be opened from within the active Microsoft Word for Windows session. When documents are associated with the executable file (WINWORD.EXE), Word for Windows does not determine whether an instance of the program is running; it just opens an instance of the program executable file for that particular document. Subsequently opening other documents attached to Mail messages will result in additional instances of the program being started.

This behavior is the way Microsoft Word for Windows is designed to handle opening separate document files directly; it is not caused by the Microsoft Mail for PC Networks Windows client.

RESOLUTION

You can avoid this problem by associating a .DOC file with "Microsoft Word 6.0 Document" rather than with WINWORD.EXE.