Save report VI from report generation toolkit is broken

[ErinDavey]

I ran into this same issue. For some reason or another, the mass compile trick did not work for me. So I deleted the invoke node and replaced it with a new one by right-clicking on the Excel Workbook reference and going to Create > Method > SaveAs. The new invoke node has the "WorkIdentity" input that someone mentioned earlier. It doesn't have to be wired, it just has to show up on the node for the broken run arrow to go away.

[James_McN]

I'm so happy someone else has seen this and I'm not going mad!

Problem is if you build n executable and share it with someone who doesn't have workidentity it will crash because the calling convention doesn't match.

My only workaround was to reinstall an older version of excel and disable automatic updates.

Since I guess your office updates are controlled by IT it will be interesting to see if others have this issue now

[ckc8302]

I just encountered this issue as well. All of our corporate PCs are managed (automatic updates) and one of the laboratory test PCs was giving me the popup about updates that needed to be completed. So, I had to restart the PC to implement the updates. Immediately after the restart, a large portion of my LV code was broken. I traced it all the way down to the exact same property node that you're showing here and was able to fix the problem by re selecting "Save As". So, thank you so much for this thread! However, these kinds of issues are absolutely terrifying for me; as I could have chased this problem for days/weeks. These are the kinds of issues that can completely cripple a test lab. I hope that some of the NI Application Engineers are taking note of this one!

[Ben]

---

@ckc8302 wrote:

...

 I hope that some of the NI Application Engineers are taking note of this one!

---

It is not an NI issue, it is a Microsoft issue.

ActiveX calls are just invocations of the methods exposed by MS. If they change the interface it breaks the caller.

Ben

[Logan_K]

As a note, the readme for the toolkit states:

---

You must have both Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel installed before installing the Report Generation Toolkit.

---

I believe that part of the install process of the toolkit involves a mass compile, so if you install or upgrade excel after installing the toolkit, some of the activex interfaces could break.

[ckc8302]

Thank you for your prompt reply and explanation of this Ben. In some ways I wish it was an NI problem, because I never have any trouble getting support from NI. Unfortunately, we are subject to automatic (forced, mandatory) updates on MS; so these types of MS issues are much more difficult to avoid and deal with.

[Ryan_G_EE]

I just ran into this same issue. Neither re-installing the MSRG tooklit, nor LV itself fixed the problem. The Mass Recompile didn't fix it either. I ended up opening "Excel_Save_Workbook.vi" directly from Windows Explorer, right-clicking on the _Workbook invoke node (in the block diagram) and then selecting "Relink Node" (I think that is what it was called...the option is gone now) which added the WorkIdentity input and fixed the broken run arrow. Save the VI and return to your calling VI, problem should be solved.

Look here for the file mentioned above:

C:\Program Files (x86)\National Instruments\LabVIEW 2015\vi.lib\addons\_office\_exclsub.llb\

[James_McN]

Hi Ryan,

Just beware, if you try to run this on a machine which doesn't need the change as a executable the program will crash.  If your just using it there that fix will be fine though.

[IanSh]

Hey Mac et al,

Is there a workaround for this issue? I've just found this exact thing myself in some inherited code and this forum is pretty much the only thing that came up in a search.

I'm making executables that will be used on various customer machines, so will need to make sure these don't break

The options seem to be:

1) Fix it in my dev system, which risks causing crashes for our customers.

2) Ignore it in my dev system, which is extra effort (disable this code except for RTE)

3) "Fix" (revert?) excel. Not sure about this one.

[James_McN]

Sorry you've seen it too.

I've got bad news from me. I "fixed" this by installing LabVIEW on a VM with office 2013 and disabled updates. I'm not sure whether a particular update causes this or not but I didn't have time to go digging further than this.

Cheers,

James