WD: Cannot Edit Word for Macintosh Document Object in Place (119139)

SYMPTOMS

When you insert a Word object into a document created in another program (an Excel spreadsheet for example), or when you insert an object created in another program into a Word document, you may not be able to activate the object for in-place editing.

Case 1: Word Object Inserted into a Document Created in Another Program

When you double-click a Word for the Macintosh document object that is embedded in an program that supports OLE, Word starts and the document opens in a separate window instead of activating in place as expected. You cannot edit the Word document object in place, even if you select the document object, click Object on the Edit menu, and then click Edit on the submenu that appears.

In other words, you can use only the OLE Open verb to edit a Word document object; you cannot use the OLE Edit verb to activate the document for editing in the container application.

Case 2: Object from Another Program Inserted into a Word Document

In Word 6.0, if your document contains an object you embedded from an OLE 1.0 application, such as Microsoft Excel 4.0, you cannot activate the object in Word. If you select the object, click Object on the Edit menu, and then click Edit from the submenu that appears, the application where you created the file is started and the object is opened in a separate window--as if you had clicked Open on the submenu instead of Edit.

By contrast, if your Word 6.0 document contains an OLE 2.0 embedded object, you can edit the object in place, as expected.

CAUSE

By design, Word for the Macintosh does not implement the OLE Edit verb for Word document objects. This means you cannot edit a Word document object in place, as described in case 1, even when the container application supports OLE.

In case 2, you cannot edit an OLE 1.0 object in place simply because the server program does not support OLE 2.0 in-place editing functionality (in-place editing was introduced for the first time in OLE 2.0).

In contrast, the Edit verb in Word 6.0 for Windows is fully functional for in-place editing of Word document objects (provided, of course, that the container application supports OLE 2.0).

MORE INFORMATION

In Word for Windows, when you edit an embedded Word document object in place, some of the Word menus and toolbars temporarily replace those of the container (active) program. You can then edit the object without leaving the container program. This functionality does not exist with Word for the Macintosh document objects.