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Embedded Word Document In Excel Icon Issues

Anonymous
2017-09-23T16:11:50+00:00

Hello

I've embedded a Word document into an Excel file. Everything works great, however, it looks ugly.

My main issues are:

  • When I click on the Word file's icon, the icon shows a bounding box around it.
  • The Word file's icon can currently be resized and repositioned anywhere in the Excel document.

So, my questions are:

  • How do I get rid of the bounding box?
  • Right now the embedded Word file seems to be "hovering" over the Excel file rather than contained within a cell. How do I get the file icon to be the content of the cell?
  • Finally, once the above has been achieved, how do I lock the icons size and position inside the cell?

Thanks in advance.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Excel | For home | Windows

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  1. Bob Jones AKA CyberTaz MVP 435K Reputation points
    2017-09-25T14:37:42+00:00

    The direct answers to your initial 3 questions are:

    1. You can't
    2. You can't
    3. Since you can't do 1 & 2, you can't do exactly this either

    A couple of points:

    First & foremost: Objects cannot be inserted into cells... period. What Tina attempted to describe as well as any other 'tutorials' you find may be well-intended but are a misrepresentation of what actually is being done. Essentially, the object can be locked into position on a sheet so that it appears to be contained within a cell. In truth, the object still floats on the surface of the sheet.

    Second: Keeping the object anchored in place requires 2 conditions:

    1. The object's Locked property must be checked in the Format Object - Protection dialog, &
    2. Protection must be applied to the sheet

    As you've found, however, with Protection enabled the object icon is rendered as a static graphic & cannot be opened.

    Although it isn't exactly what you want, the only option I can suggest is to insert a Hyperlink to the document in a cell... An icon could be included as well with the Hyperlink in an adjacent cell. The Hyperlink will work even when Protection is enabled to preserve the positioning of the icon. A down side of this method, though, is that a copy of the document is not embedded in the Excel file, so a copy of the document must travel with the workbook.

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  1. Anonymous
    2017-09-25T09:03:50+00:00

    Thanks for your reply; however, that solution means the icon has a bounding box around it and can be moved around the spreadsheet. 

    The solution I need requires the icon to be static, contained within the cell, clickable, and have no bounding box. 

    If it can't be static, having the movement contained to the cell boundaries would be good enough.

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  2. Anonymous
    2017-09-25T08:22:28+00:00

    Hi Tarten,

    You will need to uprotect the sheet and then click to open the embedded document.

    Thanks,

    Tina

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  3. Anonymous
    2017-09-24T15:59:07+00:00

    Thanks for the reply.

    I did as suggested; however, the file icon is now no longer clickable meaning the icon is positioned perfectly but no Word document opens when you click on it. 

    Is this possible to fix?

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  4. Anonymous
    2017-09-24T10:26:50+00:00

    Hi Tarten,

    To get the embedded Word document icon to position inside a cell and lock it, please perform the following steps:

    1. Adjust the icon bounding box's height and width, and move it to position inside a cell.
    2. Right click on the icon > click Format Object... > Properties > Move and size with cells > OK.
    3. Select the other cells > Right click on the selected area > click Format Cells... > Protection > Uncheck Locked button > OK.
    4. Click Tools in the top menu bar > Protection > Protect Sheet... > OK.

    For the requirement to make the bounding box of the embedded Word document invisible, we can not achieve it. We welcome and encourage you to share your idea through User Voice. Many features have been designed or upgraded based on customers' ideas. It is the best way to perfect our products.

    Thanks for your understanding,

    Tina

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