Method 'Add' of object CommandBars failed (Word 2003)

[ChrisGreaves]

Has anyone a clue for a potential quick fix?
My Word2003 application (MRUse.dot) has been working fine for years, but got sick about three weeks ago, and is sulking petulantly.
The RTE reported bears one of those magical numbers '-2147467259 (80004005)'.
So far I have tried, in various combinations and sequences:-

1. Cleaning the registry
2. Revo-uninstalling Office 2003
3. Reinstalling Office 2003
4. (Bovey's) Word VBA Code Cleaner the failing template (MRUse.dot) and the utility library (UW.dot)
5. Removing all other application templates from the Word\Startup folder
6. Adding a command bar manually.
7. Adding a command bar by an isolated snippet of VBA code
8. Renaming Normal.dot (to force a fresh Normal.dot)
9. Crying myself to sleep at night

I am this close (holds finger and thumb about 1/4 inch apart) from breaking down and reinstalling Win7, and wading into a million updates, reinstalling applications (Firefox, FileZilla, Thunderbird, Juice, Revo ...).

I found fixes for this problem in Excel ("Delete the Excel.XLB file") and tried that, with little faith.

(signed) "Desperate" of Toronto.

[StuartR]

Have you verified that the application works on a different PC using the same .dot file?

[ChrisGreaves]

Have you verified that the application works on a different PC using the same .dot file?

Go to the top of the class!
Thanks Stuart
That's the simple scientific test that had escaped my mind. I'll go hunt out another Office 2003 PC ASAP.

[richardbarrett]

Are you trying to add a command bar with the same name as a command bar that you previously used and subsequently deleted? I recall that Word doesn't like that.

[ChrisGreaves]

Are you trying to add a command bar with the same name as a command bar that you previously used and subsequently deleted? I recall that Word doesn't like that.

Sorry Richard, I missed seeing this when it was posted.
The application "MRUse" is trying to add a command bar "MRUse" after first making sure that all previous versions of the command bar "MRUse" have been deleted; this is part of the application's startup task, i.e. occurs each time I load MSWord for the past, oh, seven years?
Say 7x365x10 times it's run quite happily, and suddenly refuses to work.
But please see my next post (5 minutes ...)

[ChrisGreaves]

I'll go hunt out another Office 2003 PC ASAP.

Well, time passed and I was unable to locate another Win7/Office2003 system. (Note to self: get out more and do more volunteer work ...)
HOWEVER: This morning, in a fit of idleness, I decided to swing dear old MRUse.dot back into the MSWord startup folder, and you'll never guess what happened.

It worked!

Huh? My guess is that a couple of months of registry cleanup/modification (easyCleaner, CCCleaner, and Windows/Office updates) have randomly shuffled bits in the registry removing whatever corruption I'm Guessing might have been there.


Moral: If it doesn't work, ignore it for a while and it will go bother someone else.