This page last changed on Nov 11, 2008 by smaddox.

You can display and view an Office document that is attached to a Confluence page. If you have an Office application installed, you will also be able to edit the Office document in your Office application.

This is just one of the ways Confluence can interact with Office documents. For an overview of all Office Connector features, please refer to Working with the Office Connector.

Your System Administrator can enable or disable the Office Connector or parts of it. The Office Connector options can appear in different places on your Confluence page, depending on the themes and configuration of your Confluence site. Please refer to Configuring the Office Connector in the Confluence Administration Guide and discuss any configuration problems with your administrator.

On this page:

Error formatting macro: toc: java.lang.NullPointerException

Prerequisites

If you want to make use of the View File macro or to view Office documents attached to a wiki page, you need the setup described below.

Browsers and Flash Player

You can use any browser to view an Office document on a wiki page, provided that you have installed Adobe Flash Player version 9 or later. You do not need to have an Office desktop application installed on your computer, in order to view Office documents in Confluence.

Document Types

To be displayed in Confluence, the document needs to be valid Microsoft Office 97-2003 document, of the following types:

  • .doc
  • .xls
  • .ppt
  • .pdf

If you are using OpenOffice to create and edit the documents, you will need to save your document in Microsoft Office 97-2003 format before attaching it to a Confluence page.

Attaching and Displaying an Office Document

To attach and display an Office document in Confluence,

  1. Attach the Office document to a Confluence page:
    • View the Confluence page where you want to display your document.
    • Open the 'Tools' menu and select 'Attachments'.
    • Browse for your Office document and upload it to the Confluence page.
      You will find detailed instructions in Attaching Files to a Page.
  2. Now you have two options for displaying the attached document:
    • You can display the document embedded into the Confluence page, via View File macro. The basic syntax is:
      {viewfile:myDocument.ext}

      Refer to the detailed instructions on the View File macro.

    • You can also display a list of attachments via the Attachments macro. People viewing the page will be able to click the 'View' link to see the Office document in Confluence. The basic syntax is:
      {attachments}

      Refer to the detailed instructions on the Attachments macro.

Viewing and Editing the Attached Office Document

If an Office document is attached to a Confluence page, you can view the attached Office document from within Confluence. View the Office document in one of the following ways:

  • Search for the Office document by file name, then click the 'View' link next to the Office document on the Search results page. (See Searching Confluence.)
  • View the list of attachments for a specific Confluence page, then click the 'View' link next to the Office document on the Attachments page. (See Viewing Attachment Details.)
  • View a list of attachments displayed on a page via the Attachments macro, then click the 'View' link next to the Office document in the list of attachments. (See Displaying List of Attachments in a Page.)
  • View a Confluence page which has the Office document embedded in the page via the View File macro. (See View File Macro.)

Any Confluence user who has an Office application installed will also be able to launch their Office editor from within Confluence:

Troubleshooting

Problems? Please refer to our guide to the Office Connector limitations and known issues.

RELATED TOPICS

View File Macro
Working with the Office Connector

Configuring the Office Connector in the Confluence Administration Guide

Take me back to Confluence User Guide

Document generated by Confluence on Dec 03, 2008 15:17