OLE object icon for MS Office documents

HCL Domino Domino Forum
1

If you are creating an MS Office OLE object in Notes 6.x running on Windows XP with Office XP or 2003 installed, the OLE object cannot be displayed as an Word or Excel icon, it just displays as a square box.

But this doesn’t happen with MS Office 2000 and below. Any idea what’s the cause of this?

2

Subject: OLE object icon for MS Office documents (solved)

Note This issue occurs in all Office 2003 and Office XP products, in Microsoft WordPad, and in third-party products.

CAUSE

This issue occurs because Office uses the CreateMetaFile function in the Ole32.dll file to obtain the object preview picture. The

CreateMetaFile function is limited to Windows Metafile Format (WMF) pictures. Therefore, the picture only contains 16-bit color

at most.

Some file types use 32-bit color icons in Windows XP and in Windows Server 2003. If Windows uses a 32-bit color schema, the

CreateMetaFile function cannot obtain the appropriate WMF preview picture in the Ole32.dll file. Therefore, the

CreateMetaFile function returns a blank picture.

Note This issue occurs in any application that uses the CreateMetaFile function.

WORKAROUND

To work around this issue, change your color quality settings to 16-bit color. To do this, follow these steps:

  1. Right -click the desktop, and then click Properties.

  2. On the Settings tab, select Medium (16 bit) in the Color quality list.

  3. Click OK.

  4. Try to insert the object again.