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Office 2013 returns an error inserting Scriptable ActiveX controls onto a worksheet

  • Article

By Amber Mertes

In Excel 2013, use of certain scriptable controls on a worksheet was deprecated. You will experience errors similar to those below when trying to insert one of the controls. The change was implemented to improve security and these errors are expected. This issue affects:

Web Browser Control
Microsoft Scriptlet Component
DHTML Editing Control
DHTML Editing Control (Safe for Scripting)

Errors you may experience:

Excel 2013:      "Cannot insert object"

Word 2013:     “This object cannot be inserted due to your policy settings. This error might occur if ActiveX controls or embedded objects in this file are blocked by policy settings. More information about this error message online.”

PowerPoint 2013:  “This ActiveX control cannot be inserted”

Workarounds:
1.  Use the control in a VBA UserForm
2.  Create or use a custom wrapper for the control

Additional Information
Cannot insert certain scriptable ActiveX controls into Office 2013 documents
https://support.microsoft.com/kb/2793374

Comments

  • Anonymous
    January 15, 2013
    argh! I wasted a day trying to figure this out. Why do you make it so difficult to embed a web page onto a ppt slide??? We have (interactive) html output from a process and just want to include that as part of the presentation.

    • Anonymous
      May 06, 2016
      The comment has been removed