Unable to open word or excel documents from desktop or folder icon

[Guest]

I am unable to open either word or excel documents from my desktop or from
folders by clicking on the icons. I can open the documents by first going
into programs, select word or excel, and then open the document from the open
menu. This is cumbersome. Has anyone had such a problem? I have a fairly
new Dell.

 

[Elmo]

I am unable to open either word or excel documents from my desktop or from
folders by clicking on the icons. I can open the documents by first going
into programs, select word or excel, and then open the document from the open
menu. This is cumbersome. Has anyone had such a problem? I have a fairly
new Dell.

What happens when you attempt to open the files with a double-click? Is
there an error message?

Right-click one of the files, click Open. Does that open it?

Right-click, click Open With, select Word, or Excel, depending on the
filetype. does that open it? If so, do this again, check the box
"Always use the selected program to open this type of file. If it's
already selected, change programs and select the box, then use Open With
to select and lock in the proper program. Do that for each extension..
That should fix the file associations for those extensions.