Stupid Excel Question

January 30, 2008 9:56 AM

Excel 2003 - how can I get 2 or more xls files to open in separate windows?

For some reason now when I open 2 or more excel files they open in the same window making jumping btwn the 2 or viewing side by side a pain. Help - I want 2 excel windows side by side.

Sorry this is probably an amazingly easy fix...

posted by doorsfan to computers & internet (12 comments total)

If you open excel and then open the file, rather than just opening the file straight it will open a new excel window.
posted by sulaine at 10:00 AM on January 30

Oh man this is my favourite one. I use excel extensively, and for me the best way is to open a second instance of excel.

Go to Start, choose Run, Browse and select the C: Drive Program Files/MS Office/excel.exe file. This will open a second copy of excel so you can easily flick between your workbooks.

For some reason, openining a second instance on the command line only works for excel. I tried for Word and Powerpoint to no avail.
posted by Funmonkey1 at 10:35 AM on January 30 [1 favorite]

Sounds like you're on Windows? If so, you can also click the little icon in the upper right corner that looks like two slightly overlapping boxes--that will un-Maximize both file windows and allow you to resize and move them so that you can see them both side-by-side.
posted by statolith at 10:37 AM on January 30

The automated way of what statolith suggested is to choose 'Arrange...' from the window menu. You can then choose 'vertical' to get them to be side by side.
posted by buttercup at 10:43 AM on January 30

You can also hit Control-Tab to switch between the two spreadsheets.
posted by hootch at 10:50 AM on January 30

I asked the same question about powerpoint about a year ago. That thread has the answers you're looking for.
posted by chrisamiller at 10:58 AM on January 30

Easy fix:

In Excel, go to TOOLS / OPTIONS / VIEW tab / ensure that the "Windows in Taskbar" option is checked.

That's it.
posted by iam2bz2p at 11:12 AM on January 30

iam2bz2p has it. The Windows in taskbar option controls this behavior.
posted by Pants! at 11:19 AM on January 30

im2bz2p's answer doesn't have two application windows, it just shows all documents on the taskbar.
posted by bigmusic at 11:19 AM on January 30

You don't have to do that cludge that they used in the PP thread, sulaine's solution works fo rme.
posted by bigmusic at 11:21 AM on January 30

If you open excel and then open the file, rather than just opening the file straight it will open a new excel window.

I use this method as well because it works so much better in a two monitor setup. However, it creates some weird copy/paste behavior. I found that to copy from a spreadsheet in one Excel session to a spreadsheet in the other Excel session, you have to Paste Special->Csv.
posted by mullacc at 2:28 PM on January 30

Yeah, just open a new instance of Excel (by clicking the icon or whatnot) and then open your file. I do this all the time-I hate that everything opens in one window automatically.
posted by that girl at 4:21 PM on January 30