Microsoft KB Archive/890474

= You receive a &quot;The address of this site is not valid&quot; error message when you click a hyperlink in an Office 2003 document =

Article ID: 890474

Article Last Modified on 10/15/2007

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Office Word 2003
 * Microsoft Office Access 2003
 * Microsoft Office Excel 2003
 * Microsoft Office Outlook 2003
 * Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2003
 * Microsoft Office Publisher 2003
 * Microsoft Office FrontPage 2003

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Important This article contains information about modifying the registry. Before you modify the registry, make sure to back it up and make sure that you understand how to restore the registry if a problem occurs. For information about how to back up, restore, and edit the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

256986 Description of the Microsoft Windows Registry



SYMPTOMS
In a Microsoft Office 2003 document, when you click a hyperlink that opens another document, you may experience the following symptoms:  The document does not open. You receive the following error message:

The address of this site is not valid. Check the address and try again.





CAUSE
This problem may occur if all the following conditions are true:
 * The document that contains the hyperlink was saved in an Office 2003 program.
 * The document that contains the hyperlink and the document that the hyperlink opens are located on the same network server.
 * The document that contains the hyperlink and the document that the hyperlink opens are located in separate shares on the network server.
 * The hyperlink contains a relative URL.

Notes
 * By default, a relative URL for the hyperlink is created when you save the document in Microsoft Office Excel 2003.
 * A relative URL has one or more missing parts. The missing information is taken from the page that contains the URL. For example, if the protocol and Web server are missing, the Web browser uses the protocol and domain, such as .com, .org, or .edu, of the current page.



RESOLUTION
This problem was first fixed in a hotfix that is now contained in a service pack. If you installed the latest Office 2003 service pack, you do not have to install the hotfix.

Service pack information
This problem is corrected in Office 2003 Service Pack 2.

To resolve this problem, obtain the latest service pack for Office 2003. For more information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

870924 How to obtain the latest service pack for Office 2003

How to obtain the hotfix
This issue is fixed in the Office 2003 post-Service Pack 1 Hotfix Package that is dated November 25, 2004. For additional information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

890472 Description of the Office 2003 post-Service Pack 1 hotfix package: November 25, 2004

After you install this hotfix, follow the steps that are listed in the &quot;More Information&quot; section to set the  registry key and to enable the hotfix.



WORKAROUND
If this problem occurs even after you install Office 2003 Service Pack 2 or apply the hotfix and registry modification earlier, use the one of the following methods to work around this problem.

Method 1: Disable &quot;Update Links on Save&quot;
This method prevents Microsoft Office Excel, Microsoft Office Word, and Microsoft Office PowerPoint from modifying the hyperlink that you created. Additionally, this method prevents possible damage to the link format. The Update Links on Save option is an Office-wide option. For example, if you change the option in Word, the option is automatically changed in Excel and in PowerPoint.
 * 1) On the Tools menu, click Options.
 * 2) On the General tab, click Web Options.
 * 3) On the Files tab, click to clear the Update Links on Save check box.
 * 4) Click OK.

Note Later files that are saved will not update the hyperlinks during the save operation. Therefore, working hyperlinks will remain in their working format.

Method 2: Manually Set the file location
When you create the hyperlink, use the Link to File dialog box to create the hyperlink instead of typing the path.
 * 1) On the Insert menu, click Hyperlink.
 * 2) In the Link to box, click Existing File or Web Page.
 * 3) Click Browse for File.
 * 4) Type the path of the network share, and then press ENTER to list the contents of that share.
 * 5) Click the file to which you want to link.
 * 6) Click OK two times.



MORE INFORMATION
Warning If you use Registry Editor incorrectly, you may cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that you can solve problems that result from using Registry Editor incorrectly. Use Registry Editor at your own risk.

To enable this hotfix, follow these steps:  Quit all Office 2003 programs. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.</li> Locate and then click to select the following registry subkey:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Common

</li> After you select the subkey that is specified in step 3, point to New on the Edit menu, and then click DWORD Value.</li> Type HypAlternateResolveToRel, and then press ENTER.</li> Right-click HypAlternateResolveToRel, and then click Modify.</li> In the Value data box, type 1, and then click OK.</li> On the File menu, click Exit to quit Registry Editor.</li></ol>

Additional query words: office2003 off2003 access2003 acc2003 acc2k3 excel2003 xl2003 xl2k3 outlook2003 ol2003 ol2k3 powerpoint2003 ppt2003 ppt2k3 publisher2003 pub2003 pub2k3 word2003 wd2003 wd2k3

Keywords: kberrmsg kbbug kbfix kbqfe kboffice2003sp1fix kbsavefile kboffice2003presp2fix kbhotfixserver KB890474

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