I have an Excel (Office 2003) file inventory.xls that I use on a daily basis.
How can I force Excel to always open with inventory.xls when I click on the Excel icon/link in my (Windows) Start Menu?
I tried entering it in the link's "Properties/Start in:" but that does not work.

Create shortcut for the inventory.xls file in Start Menu. Default registered application for the file type (Excel) will open the file.

Here are a few references I found in a quick search.


Save the file into the XLStart folder, which is created when Excel is installed. In Windows XP, this folder is located at C:\Documents and Settings\[user]\Application Data\Microsoft\Excel\XLSTART. Anytime you open Excel, it automatically opens all files in that folder.

I just have a shortcut to my file and open that, as opposed to opening Excel, and clicking File>Open> and finding my file.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/291288

Thanks guys!
I'd figured out Puppy's and Billp's 2nd solution already, but don't want an extra entry in my Start menu.
The XLSTART solution will be it.
I checked Google like mad, but never saw any reference to this, good sleuthing!

Then it is easy. Replace existing shortcut to Excel application with shortcut to the particular XLS file in your Start Menu.