Article ID: 181067
Article Last Modified on 1/22/2007
APPLIES TO
- Microsoft Word 97 Standard Edition
This article was previously published under Q181067
SYMPTOMS
If Microsoft Word or another program cannot open any additional Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) channels, the following message may be displayed:
CAUSE
When using DDE to communicate between programs, a separate "channel" or line of communication for each DDE conversation is created. It is possible to have multiple DDE conversations happening at the same time. While there is no absolute limit to the number of DDE conversations that can exist simultaneously, there is a relative limit that depends on the amount of system resources available. This limit varies from system to system.
WORKAROUND
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To prevent the error message from occurring, terminate each DDE conversation after you are finished using the channel. To terminate a DDE channel, use either of the following commands.
Syntax to Terminate a Specific Channel Number --------------------------------------------- DDETerminate(ChannelNumber)
-or-
Syntax to Terminate All DDE Channels ------------------------------------ DDETerminateAll
For example, the following macro (Sub procedure) uses DDETerminate to close each DDE channel that is initiated.
Sub DDETest For x = 1 to 40 chan = DDEInitiate("Excel", "Sheet1") ' Your other commands go here. DDETerminate chan Next x End Sub
To reproduce the "Session too complex...." error message, start Word and Excel and run a macro that opens a number of DDE channels without terminating the channels.
Sub DDEReproduceError For x = 1 to 40 n = DDEInitiate("Excel","Sheet1") Next x End Sub
REFERENCES
For more information about getting help with Visual Basic for Applications, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
163435 VBA: Programming Resources for Visual Basic for Applications
Keywords: kbcode kbmacroexample kbprb kbprogramming KB181067