Hi, I searched through the forums and I couldn't see anything directly pertaining to my situation, so I thought I'd bite the bullet and ask the question.

In any Office 2000 application, Word, Outlook, Excel, Powerpoint, etc, I cannot open the help files, either by way of the office assistant, or directly through the help menu. It sits for a while as if it is loading something, but then nothing ever happens.

I have not intstalled service release 1 for Office 2000 cause it causes very bad things to my install of Office. And no, it's not because I have a "pirated" copy of Office, I don't know why it screws things up, it just does. I've never needed SR1 anyway, cause as far as my system has been concerned Office 2000 right out of the box has been fine.

I've tried repairing the install of Office and reinstalling it, but the issue stays.

My system an software specs are as follows:

Windows 2000 Pro sp2

Office 2000 Academic Release (I think this was the same as Professional, but I'm not sure, I can't remember, as I don't have the box in front of me, and I'd have to go searching for it to find out )

Athlon 1.2Ghz on KT133A mobo w/ 4.32 4 in 1's installed
384Mb PC-133 RAM

I'm not sure what else might be needed to troubleshoot this one.

Anyway, I'd appreciate any thoughts or insights you fine forum members might have on this subject, it sure is perplexing to me.

Office 2k has a "REPAIR" option from its install Cd... use it!

* Question: When you installed it? Did you choose the option to put its helpfiles on your harddrive, or CD?? This matters... and if you changed your Cd-Rom's driver letter original assignment? This can toss Office 2k for a loop on the Cd-loaded features (if you did not do the COMPLETELY INSTALL & RUN FROM HARDDRIVE ALL FEATURES option during installation of it)

(Hope that helps some!)



APK

Thanks for the ideas, but no.

Alas, it makes no difference whether I have the CD in the drive or not. Also I have not changed the letter designation for the cdrom drive.

I cannot honestly say whether or not I chose to install the help files to the hard drive, all I ever do is choose the default install for both disc one and two. But I think they are set to run from hard drive automatically aren't they?

Still perplexed.

Office2k's got a FUNNY kind of installer, what with that tree setup it uses!

You have to right click on the TOPMOST item, and select "Install all features to hard drive", or it won't on MANY of them!

* Try that...

(Again, if that also fails you? Take the "repair office" option from the install Cd of it & try repair missing files & registry stuff!)

APK

P.S.=> One of the downloadeable patches for it, in a single file, is a registry repair options tool for it as well at the MS Office Update site too! apk

Jeeze, no luck!

I tried every one of your ideas, including the registry repair tool AND the Repair function from within the setup program, and the problem is still there.

I checked to make sure the help files were installed onto the hard drive, but that didn't fix it either.

I can't figure it out, there is no reason why this would happen, I don't even get an error message that could help me figure out the problem.

Thanks a lot for your help though.

So I did a little hard drive search, and found all the help files are in a folder called "1033" under "C:\Program Files\microsoft office\Office\"

They are all there, various names, the one for Outlook 2000 is called "OUTLHLP9.CHM". If I double click directly on the help file it opens up just fine, showing me all the help topics for the program that it is for.

Now since these files are in the right place, and obviously not corrupted, shouldn't they work from within the program?

This is a strange one. I'd really like to fix this, since I'm in need of both the Outlook and Excel help files, and double clicking on them from the install directory doesn't give me any options for searching them like using them from within the programs.

So any ideas now? I'm as perplexed as ever.

"
So I did a little hard drive search, and found all the help files are in a folder called "1033" under "C:\Program Files\microsoft office\Office\"

They are all there, various names, the one for Outlook 2000 is called "OUTLHLP9.CHM". If I double click directly on the help file it opens up just fine, showing me all the help topics for the program that it is for.

Now since these files are in the right place, and obviously not corrupted, shouldn't they work from within the program?

This is a strange one. I'd really like to fix this, since I'm in need of both the Outlook and Excel help files, and double clicking on them from the install directory doesn't give me any options for searching them like using them from within the programs.

So any ideas now? I'm as perplexed as ever. "

On a guess? Registry corruption... has to be!

The GUIDS used by Office are not summoning the help topics from their associated programs, or... the .GID file for help files is hosed!

Now... those are "Compiled HTM" files those .chm & I do not believe they use .GID locators or .cnt content files!

SO I am guessing your Office install is going nutty... and the GUIDS or links in the registry to them for the apps are gone or shot!

*

(Sorry man, unless someone can come up with a better idea, or solution? I stand by that sad analysis... I'd reinstall it after uninstalling it personally!)

APK

P.S.=> No Office services packs in place? Uninstall & reinstall is the best advice I can give... unless you feel like MASSIVE manual registry hacks! apk

Yeah, I did an uninstall and reinstall, and I even did some registry hacks.

There is a help topic specifically about this issue on the Microsoft web site, the URL is:
[URL]http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q237/3/55.ASP?LN=EN-CA&SD=gn&FR=0[/URL]

I did everything that the help topic suggested and none of it worked.

I can't think of anything else to try, but it sounds from readin that help page that it might have something to do with IE5.5sp2, so maybe I should try update IE to version 6???

I just don't know.

"
Yeah, I did an uninstall and reinstall, and I even did some registry hacks.

There is a help topic specifically about this issue on the Microsoft web site, the URL is:
[URL]http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q237/3/55.ASP?LN=EN-CA&SD=gn&FR=0[/URL]

I did everything that the help topic suggested and none of it worked.

I can't think of anything else to try, but it sounds from readin that help page that it might have something to do with IE5.5sp2, so maybe I should try update IE to version 6???

I just don't know. "

I would not doubt that would help man... the IE 6 engine MIGHT patch it! Who knows... after all, those are compiled HTML files!

APK

Well that's enough. I installed IE6, something I have been avoiding, cause I had terrible experiences with the public beta.

It made no difference, still no help. I guess I'm stuck with browsing the help files manually from the "1033" directory. That is absolutely dumb.

PS, I also installed all the updates to Office 2000, and they broke the install, ie, no Office application would run, just like the last time I did it. I don't know why, cause I assure you I don't have a priated copy of Office, but the patches act as though I do.

Personally I think I'm gonna give up, I've reinstalled Office from the CD, and I'm leaving it the way it is, everything else works, except the help, and I guess I can find those manually anyway.

Thank you very much for your help.

"
I also installed all the updates to Office 2000, and they broke the install, ie, no Office application would run, just like the last time I did it. I don't know why, cause I assure you I don't have a printed copy of Office, but the patches act as though I do."

I agree with you,

I have heard that happening so many times, it's not funny... that's the one installer & patch system that seems to be VERY troubled from MS.

(Not always, but alot of the time!)

Sorry I could not help more man...

APK