http://bugs.winehq.org/show_bug.cgi?id=13822
--- Comment #10 from John Halubek jhalubek@yahoo.com 2008-07-13 03:23:30 --- ======= ====== === Problem SOLVED !!! ======= ====== ===
Just to follow up on my earlier post ... I think I have found a way to overcome this bug. So far I have only tested it on Debian Lenny (my Debian Etch computer is at the office), but I'm fairly certain it will work on that computer too.
First, some background: I moved my ~/.wine/ directory to a different location (for backup). Next, I installed MS Office 97 into a fresh ~/.wine/ directory. That failed to solve the problem, so I deleted the whole ~/.wine/ directory and downgraded my version of Wine to 0.9.25 (the version in Debian Etch). Once again, I installed MS Office 97 (into the fresh ~/.wine/ directory). That still failed to solve the problem.
So once again, I deleted my ~/.wine/ directory. Next, I took an installation of IEs4Linux and copied the contents of the ~/.ies4linux/ie6/ directory into a fresh ~/.wine/ directory and installed MS Office 97 one more time. That _solved the problem_ !!!
To test my solution, I opened a few spreadsheets created by MS Excel 2003 (running on MS Windows XP), modified them and saved them with MS Excel 97 running in Wine 0.9.25 without any problems. Those tests included one 2.3 MB spreadsheet and I also reopened them and resaved them without any problems. Next, I upgraded my version of Wine to 1.0 (the version currently in Debian Lenny) and effortlessly opened, edited and saved the original MS Excel 2003 spreadsheets.
Lesson #1: Although we happened to discover this bug very recently, the fact that it also occurs in Wine 0.9.25 indicates that it has (in reality) been a problem for a very long time.
Lesson #2: The fact MS Excel can save files when installed into a ~/.wine/ directory with MS Internet Explorer 6 indicates that the bug is caused by a faulty replacement for one of Microsoft's own DLL files.
Why does MS Internet Explorer 6 solve the problem? MS Internet Explorer provides some of the most critical DLL files. (In fact, removing it from an installation of MS Windows will kill Redmond's operating system). So replacing some of Wine's DLLs with Microsoft's own DLLs provides the libraries MS Excel needs to properly save a file.
I hope this helps!