Excel shortcuts no longer working

[staffordian]

Has anyone else come across an issue I've had for the last few days

I have a shortcut to Excel (Excel 2019) on my taskbar. (A laptop running Windows 10)

To launch a file, I have always right clicked on the taskbar shortcut and selected a pinned or recent file from the list.

Now, whenever I try this I get a message saying "The item that you have selected is unavailable. It might have been moved, renamed or removed. Do you want to remove it from the list?" I can then click a Delete or a Cancel button.

The issue is that none of the files have been moved, and if I open Excel, the introductory page has them there and they will open from there when clicked.

My laptop runs Windows 10 v1909. It updated on 13 October, but as far as I can see nothing major changed, so I'm unsure if something in this latest update led to the problem or if the update just happened to be at about the time this problem came about.

The only other thing I've done recently is remove Excel 2007, which I'd used for years. I upgraded to Office 2019 a few months back and having decided to stick with it, I last week removed the 2007 version. I'm not sure if the issue I've come across occurred immediately after this, but it was around the same time.

I've Googled this issue and it seems I'm not alone, but others saw it ages ago, some more recently and for some it affects all shortcuts. For me, the Word shortcut still works, and for all my other programs, I simply open them and don't tend to have a selection of files for them.

I've not seen any solution online apart from creating a .bat file and running it, which I'm a bit suspicious of trying, especially when others say it doesn't work anyway.

I'd be very grateful for any thoughts about what I might try to resolve this.

TIA

Staffordian

[AsleepInYorkshire]

All my Excel shortcuts are on my desktop. I don't use any pinned to the toolbar. So I'm not sure I can help. Sorry

Have you tried this site?

https://stackoverflow.com/

AiY

[SteelCamel]

It's possible that it's got confused by you removing the old version. The first thing I'd try is re-creating the shortcut (right-click and "unpin from taskbar", then right-click excel in the start menu and "pin to taskbar").
If that doesn't work, if you go to Settings, under apps and programs, find Office, there should be an option to "repair" which runs through the installation process and reinstates any missing files or settings.

[xeny]

have you ended up with Excel files associated with Excel 2007, which is no longer present? If so, simply reset the association for .xlsx to Excel 2019.

[staffordian]

Thanks for the suggestions.

I looked at stackoverflow, but it seemed to focus more on programming, and there was nothing already there about the issue.

I've already tried removing and reinstating the shortcut, as well as deleting and recreating the pinned list, which unfortunately didn't work.

As far as I can see, it's also not a file type or file association issue. I have used .xlsm for ages, but in any case deleting the list and trying to pin the files from the recent list fails to cure it (nor will recents, newly created, work either. I still get the "error" message).

I've not tried a repair. That's a good call and will be my next step.

Many thanks.

I'll report back, hopefully to say it's sorted, in case anyone else gets this problem.

[Stompa]

If you right click on the taskbar shortcut, then right click on one of the pinned or recent files and choose 'Properties', does it show the correct file location? I'm guessing it probably will, but worth checking just in case.

[PrefInvestor]

This is probably a sledge hammer to crack a nut, but I suggest that you proceed as follows:-

1. First use the Start Menu to try starting Excel 2019. If that works OK then Excel is still working OK, so proceed to Step 4.

2. If Excel doesn’t start then you should re-install it to fix that. To do this with my Office 365 if you go into the Control Panel, Programs and Features and right click on Office in the list then there is a “Change” menu item. Clicking on this brings up two repair options the first is a “Quick Repair” which just tries to fix things locally, the second option “Online Repair” is a more comprehensive full download followed by re-install. But beware Office 2019 might not be the same. If its not the same and you’ve still got your Office DVD then you can just use that to do the re-install, but don’t forget to use Windows Update immediately afterwards to install any updates which might be necessary.

3. Having completed your re-install return to Step 1 to make sure Excel is working.

4. Once Excel is working OK then delete the existing Excel task bar shortcut (by right clicking on it and selecting “Unpin from taskbar”), just in case it’s broken. Then using the Start Menu again right click on Excel and select “pin to taskbar” (beware this may hidden in a second level “More” menu).

5. Everything should be fixed at this point. Fingers crossed !.

Operating remotely like this and without even seeing your computer I cant GUARANTEE that this will work. But these are pretty simple and straightforward steps that OUGHT to fix your problem, whatever it may be.

Good Luck.

ATB

Pref

[staffordian]

If you right click on the taskbar shortcut, then right click on one of the pinned or recent files and choose 'Properties', does it show the correct file location? I'm guessing it probably will, but worth checking just in case.

Thanks, but yes. Thier locations have not moved, and they do show the correct path. They're in Dropbox rather than on the local drive, but they are actually there, and open ok if I open them from within Excel.

[staffordian]

It's possible that it's got confused by you removing the old version. The first thing I'd try is re-creating the shortcut (right-click and "unpin from taskbar", then right-click excel in the start menu and "pin to taskbar").
If that doesn't work, if you go to Settings, under apps and programs, find Office, there should be an option to "repair" which runs through the installation process and reinstates any missing files or settings.

Success!

"Repair" worked.

In Add and remove programs, I selected Microsoft Office. There are options to uninstall or modify. Modify gives two repair options, and a suggestion to try Quick Repair first.

I used this, then for good measure shut down and restarted the laptop, and now all is as it should be.

Many thanks for the suggestion.

[staffordian]

This is probably a sledge hammer to crack a nut, but I suggest that you proceed as follows:-

1. First use the Start Menu to try starting Excel 2019. If that works OK then Excel is still working OK, so proceed to Step 4.

2. If Excel doesn’t start then you should re-install it to fix that. To do this with my Office 365 if you go into the Control Panel, Programs and Features and right click on Office in the list then there is a “Change” menu item. Clicking on this brings up two repair options the first is a “Quick Repair” which just tries to fix things locally, the second option “Online Repair” is a more comprehensive full download followed by re-install. But beware Office 2019 might not be the same. If its not the same and you’ve still got your Office DVD then you can just use that to do the re-install, but don’t forget to use Windows Update immediately afterwards to install any updates which might be necessary.

3. Having completed your re-install return to Step 1 to make sure Excel is working.

4. Once Excel is working OK then delete the existing Excel task bar shortcut (by right clicking on it and selecting “Unpin from taskbar”), just in case it’s broken. Then using the Start Menu again right click on Excel and select “pin to taskbar” (beware this may hidden in a second level “More” menu).

5. Everything should be fixed at this point. Fingers crossed !.

Operating remotely like this and without even seeing your computer I cant GUARANTEE that this will work. But these are pretty simple and straightforward steps that OUGHT to fix your problem, whatever it may be.

Good Luck.

ATB


Pref

Fortunately, I didn't need this*, but I much appreciate you going to the trouble of making the suggestion.

It will still be here if I need it in the future

* Though I did do the Office 2019 equivalent of repair as per your suggestion 2