Office 2016 doesn't open weblinks in W10

[Sheridan]

What an annoying problem this one is - users creating Word docs that have weblinks in them can't use them. When they click the link they get an error 'Unable to open . Cannot download the information you requested'

 

They can open the URLS directly in any browser so that's not the issue. Does the same for any link, http or https

 

All MS can offer is some guff about setting the ForceShellExecute registry but that didn't work for me or pretty much most people either.

 

Is there an alternative fix to this I haven't found yet?

[Koldov]

Sorry I can't really help you as we are not seeing the problem, but...

 

We are using Office 2016 and a mix of Windows 10 Enterprise LTSB/LTSC.

 

Opening a word doc and typing in http://www.bbc.co.uk or https://www.bbc.co.uk/ creates a hyperlink and ctrl+click opens it straight away in IE 11 for us (this also works using the 'Insert Hyperlink' option from the toolbar) on admin and student machines.

 

What are you doing differently? Defaulting to a different browser? Are there any Office GPOs stopping hyperlinks opening?

[Jawloms]

Try changing the default browser?

[Sheridan]

Their default browser is Chrome, and they can open the links normally in Chrome and IE11, and Edge

 

Weirdly, it works for an administrator - and when I remove any policies it still shows the same error

[Koldov]

Hmmmm....

 

Working for an administrator may point to something else but it's not along these lines is it...?

 

https://community.spiceworks.com/topic/1081820-office-won-t-open-hyperlinks

 

"Is Chrome or has Chrome ever been installed on the PC? Generally what I have seen is that Chrome breaks the association for http file type and you have to go to the default programs listing in control panel to make sure that IE has all defaults selected (not just going to IE settings and selecting make default). Or reinstall Chrome then reset defaults back to IE afterward.

 

This article has a great outline that explains each step as well if you want to double check everything."

 

https://www.ablebits.com/office-addins-blog/2014/01/16/hyperlinks-not-working-outlook/

 

Not sure what else that will break YMMV.

 

Edit: We do have Chrome but I haven't made it the default browser (not sure it actually would be the problem though as I'm sure many on here must have without any issue)...

Edited September 22, 2020 by Koldov

[Sheridan]

In case anyone has this issue I found the solution, at least in this case. The school in question had a series of GPOs applied and when investigating this I realised that some groups had IE preferences set, and in there both TLS 1.1 and 1.2 weren't checked. Not much of an issue as they use Chrome but it definitely broke this feature in Word. Enabling both and they work everywhere now.

 

Just goes to show, you may think you've changed your default browser, but IE still clings on there in the background