Excel file .xls not opening properly

users
#1

LibreOffice is trying to open a recent file with the extension .xls as if it were a .doc file. When opened directly (by saving the file to the hard drive then double clicking it) I get an error that says "this page uses frames but your browser doesn't support them" and I get only text-style menus and tools. I'm NOT trying to open this in a browser and there's no browser involved when trying to open it.

This file was originally generated by Salesforce, which often saves it as if it were an html/web file. But with a save-as operation in MS Excel, the file saves correctly as a spreadsheet file (.xls). I'm using MS Office 2007, so it's not a new file type, and I've had no problems in the past.

Any idea what is happening? I've tried opening a blank spreadsheet and inserting from a file, but no luck. Nothing happens when I do that.

Thanks,
Carl

#2

Thanks, Bill. After trying a few things, I discovered that this file doesn't open in Windows using M$ Office either, so there's something wrong with it. I had moved 3 files from Windows to my Mac to work on them, and that's where I noticed the problem. The other two files had opened fine on the Windows machine but I guess I hadn't checked this third one. My hint (inspired by your reply) was that TextEdit on a Mac thought the file was empty except for two blank lines. That program can usually open any file, so there was clearly something odd going on.

Carl