“Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac cannot start because Microsoft Office is already in use.”
- MS Office 2008, 2009
When MS Office 2008 for Mac issues this message it means there’s another copy of Office on the home / office network running with the same serial number. It may also mean OS X Leopard’s built-in firewall may be turned off. If your built-in firewall is turned on when installing Office 2008 you will see the dialog box below on application launch asking you whether you will allow ‘Microsoft Word.app to accept incoming network connections ?’
Denying this request will prevent Microsoft Word being detected and going into System Preferences > Security > Firewall and selecting “Allow only essential services” or “Set access for specific applications and services” will stop Microsoft Word accepting incoming network connections and prevent the ‘cannot start’ dialog from appearing.
However, if you are a Microsoft Entourage user you must allow Entourage access to incoming network connections. It is an email client after all! Consequently Entourage users will have to find a new serial and reset the registration information of Office 2008.
To reset the registration information and serial number of Office 2008 for Mac you must quit all Office apps and delete the following files:
1. /Users/Your Home Folder/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Office 2008/Microsoft Office 2008 Settings.plist
2. /Applications/Microsoft Office 2008/Office/OfficePID.plist
Now relaunch any of the Office 2008 apps and you’ll be prompted to enter a new serial and new registration information. You may also uninstall and reinstall Office 2008 to achieve the same end, although this is much more time consuming and relies on you having the installer.
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