Symptoms
When you use the Send To command (on the File menu) in Microsoft Word 2000 to send a Word document as an e-mail attachment, and Microsoft Outlook is your default e-mail client, you may receive an error message similar to one of the following:
OUTLOOK Error: 'The Operation Failed do to network or other communications problem. Check your connection and try again.'
-or-
OUTLOOK Error: 'The Messaging interface has returned an unknown error. If the problem persists restart Outlook.'
-or-
WORD Error: 'Word couldn't send mail because of MAPI error: Unspecified error.'
However, when you use the /a switch to start Word, this behavior does not occur.
NOTE: See the "References" section of this article for more information about using command-line switches to start Word.
Cause
This behavior can occur if a Microsoft Office registry key is corrupted.
Workaround
To work around this issue, change the mail format in Microsoft Outlook to HTML. To do this, follow these steps:
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Start Outlook, and then click Options on the Tools menu.
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On the Mail Format tab, click HTML in the Send in this message format box, and then click OK.
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Quit Outlook.
Resolution
To resolve this issue, delete the Office registry key, and then repair your Office 2000 installation. To do this, follow these steps.
Important This section, method, or task contains steps that tell you how to modify the registry. However, serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly. Therefore, make sure that you follow these steps carefully. For added protection, back up the registry before you modify it. Then, you can restore the registry if a problem occurs. For more information about how to back up and restore the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
322756 How to back up and restore the registry in Windows
NOTE: Because there are several versions of Microsoft Windows, the following steps may be different on your computer. If they are, see your product documentation to complete these steps.
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Click Start, and then click Run.
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In the Run dialog box, type regedit, and then click OK.
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In Registry Editor, navigate to the following registry key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office
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On the Registry menu, click Export Registry File.
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In the Export Registry File dialog box, select Desktop in the Save in box, and then type OfficeKeyOld in the File name box. Under Export range, click Selected branch, and then click Save.
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On the Edit menu, click Delete. Click Yes to confirm the deletion.
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On the Registry menu, click Exit.
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Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.
NOTE: In Microsoft Windows XP, click Control Panel directly on the Start menu. -
Double-click Add/Remove Programs.
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In the list of currently installed programs, click Microsoft Office 2000, and then click Add/Remove.
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In the Office Maintenance Mode Wizard, click Repair Office, click Repair errors in my Office installation, and then click Finish.
References
For additional information, click the article numbers below to view the articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
209928 WD2000: Error Message When You Try to Send Word Document as E-mail Attachment
210565 WD2000: Word Startup (Command-Line) Switches and Their Purpose
