'there was a problem sending the command to the program' error message in windows 7 using word 2007

I had this issue today and found that it was being caused by an COM add-in that was not configured properly.

As a few other people have stated, once Word had loaded, it would load documents quickly, but the inital startup of Word was slow, taking a good 20 seconds to load.

Running it with the no-addons switch pointed me in the right direction:

Winword.exe /a

http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/word-help/command-line-switches-for-microsoft-office-word-2007-HP010164010.aspx

Once I disabled the add-in, it works normally - and loads in approx 2 seconds.

We have been encountering this problem sporadically throughout my company running Win7 x64 Office 2007 32bit.

I've tried the following with this issue:

1. Office 2007 Repair (fairly simple and clean, resolves most of them)
2. Complete uninstall and reinstall (more time intensive, but usually resolves those not resolved by repair).
3. The deletion of the Word > Data reg key, (occasionally works, is user specific though)
4. Altering the shell > Open > command reg key so that /n /dde => /n "%1" (seems to work in a few cases, but bypasses the Dynamic Data Exchange, so I try to avoid doing this.)

Still have some systems that will not let go of this problem. I'm open to ideas. I'm a detail oriented guy and would really love a technical explanation of what's going on here.

Hello Molini, I've personally tried all of the above and none of it worked for me, but I did get it working in the end.

-> Start menu

-> All programs

-> Microsoft Office

-> Right click Microsoft Word

-> Click properties

-> Select compatibility tab

-> Deselect run this program in compatibility mode for:

or

-> Select your proper operating system

For some reason, mine was set to windows xp service pack 2, even though I'm running windows 7.

I tried selecting 'run this program in compatibility mode for' afterwards and the same ''there was a problem sending a command...'' error popped up, so it seems like the two are linked.

Try it for yourself, or whoever else is reading, maybe it'll fix it for ya.

Open control panel and go to Control Panel\Programs\Programs and Features.

Now click on Microsoft Office 2007.

Click on the option "Change" .

Setup prepares the important files and after that click on Add or Remove features.

Now install all the features available there and the setup will modify or resolve any problem regarding errors of office 2007.

Wanted to chime in with my resolution for this situation. I'm running Word 2007.

Open Word

Click Windows Icon in top left corner

Click Word Options at bottom

Click Resources link on left

run Microsoft Office Diagnostics [Diagnose]

It took a few minutes to run, but it corrected the issue. Now able to open Word docs without having Word already open.

Interesting how this problem seems universal, and has been going on at least since the Office 2003/Vista days; yet Microsoft has yet to recognize that it exists. When clicking on a .DOCX document to open Microsoft Word, I have received the "There is a problem sending the command to the program" for years; happens regardless of the computer, operating system or Word version. Clicking on a document icon opens Word; but, then Word cannot open the document unless the user takes additional steps. Don't bother attempting to jump through the ridiculous steps that techies throw at you. I mean, clicking on an icon should open the document; kind of basic, don't you think? Why should a user have to jump through complex fixes in attempt to get an application to do one of its most basic functions: opening a document? The only solution is to just live with it, because Microsoft is obviously not going to do anything about it. Once you get the "You can't open a Word document by clicking on the icon unless Word is already open" notice, just close the alert, and then click on the icon again. If Word is  open, you will be able to open a Word document by clicking on its icon.

bd