Question

Here’s my small bit of code.

protected void ViewVisio(string url)
{
    // open document
    Microsoft.Office.Interop.Visio.Application visApp = 
        new Microsoft.Office.Interop.Visio.Application();
    Microsoft.Office.Interop.Visio.Document visDoc =    // application hangs here
        visApp.Documents.Open(url);

    ...
}

Basically, the application just hangs forever on the line that opens the document. It never times out, even after a few hours, and it never throws an exception. I checked the Windows event logs, and there’s nothing there.

I have Office installed on my server with all the correct permissions. I’m doing the same thing with Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files and they all work just fine, so I don’t think it has anything to do with that.

So I’m at a bit of a loss here – anyone know what the issue could be?

Answer 1

Never run Microsoft Office under an automation context. Microsoft does not recommend or support this (see KB257757 here).

Microsoft does not currently recommend, and does not support, Automation of Microsoft Office applications from any unattended, non-interactive client application or component (including ASP, ASP.NET, DCOM, and NT Services), because Office may exhibit unstable behavior and/or deadlock when Office is run in this environment.