Sharepoint – Cannot open Visio files FIXED!

This issue comes up in Sharepoint 2013 when you have Visio 2010 installed and also Office 2013 installed.

This seems to be a known problem for Visio 2010 files when you have Visio 2010 and Office 2013 installed on the machine.

If you see the URL, you will see a small prefix “ms-visio:ofv” which is the protocol used for Office 2013. But, as we do not have Visio 2013 installed, it throws an error.

I have created a small registry file that will trick the system into thinking that there is Visio 2013 installed but route it to Visio 2010.

I have attached the file here having default paths. If your Office or Visio is installed elsewhere, please change. here is the source of the .reg file. Otehrwise, all users need to do is rename the file here to open up as a zip file, run the .reg file and accept all warning messages.

Download VisioReg.Zip file here

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ms-visio]
@="Url:Visio Protocol"
"URL Protocol"=""
"UseOriginalUrlEncoding"=dword:00000001

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ms-visio\DefaultIcon]
@="C:\\PROGRA~2\\MICROS~1\\Office14\\VISIO.EXE,0"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ms-visio\shell]

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ms-visio\shell\open]

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ms-visio\shell\open\command]
@="C:\\PROGRA~2\\MICROS~1\\Office15\\PROTOC~1.EXE \"%1\""