There was a problem sending the command to the program

When trying to open an Excel spread sheet by double clicking the desired file. Occasionally one may get the error message “There was a problem sending the command to the program”. But getting the error message doesn't mean you can’t view the document. You can still open excel with, then from within excel you can browse to the spread sheet you wish to open with out an issue. But that is probably too lengthy of a process for some, here is now to fix it.

For Office 2007:

Open MS Excel
Click Excel Options
Click on Advanced
Scroll to the "general" section other applications that use Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE)

For Office 2010:

Open MS Excel click on File
Click on Options
Click on Advanced
Scroll to the “general” section and uncheck Ignore other applications that use Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE)