When users try to open an excel document that rersides in WSS 2.0 they receive the following error message. "A DDE error has occurred, and a description of the error cannot be displayed because it is too long. If the filename or path is long, try renaming the file or copying it to a different folder. " I followed the steps in Microsoft Article 416351 at the link below and the error still occurs. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/416351/en-us

I was also recently recieving the 'A DDE error has occurred...' message, upon opening an Excel document in WSS 3.0, and an Excel document was already opened. So, I increased the size of the filenames, and then the documents began to open fine. Many thanks to the previous posters for opening and commenting on this thread, it gave me the idea to try to lengthen the filename.