This can happen if a third-party addin file for Word is conflicting with EndNote™'s addin files.
Note: Most of these issues should be resolved in EndNote X1 and later (except as noted below). If you are having issues with EndNote X1 and later, please let our technical support team know.
Program addins that are known to cause this type of conflict are:
EndNote X1 and later problematic addins:
EndNote X and earlier problematic addins:
- SnagIt
- Copernic Agent
- Adobe/Macromedia FlashPaper
- Adobe Contribute C3/C4
- ScanSoft/Nuance PaperPort or PDF Create!
- MSWordXMLToolbar.dot
- EZPhoto
- Workshare
- Redaction.dot
- Smartype
- odfaddin.dot
- Hummingbird Document Management
To check which addin files are loaded in Word X/2000/2002 (XP)/2003/2004/2008/2011/(2016 - Mac):
Go to "Tools > Templates and Addins" and look at the files that are checked in the box below.
To check which addin files are loaded in Word 2007/2010/2013/(2016 - Win):
1. With Word 2010/2013/(2016 - Win): Click on the File menu and select "Options." With Word 2007: Go to the Office icon in the upper left, and click “Word Options” at the bottom of this window.
2. Click on the Add-ins option on the left hand side.
3. Click on the drop-down menu next to Manage and select Word Add-ins.
4. Click Go and this will open the Templates and Add-ins screen so you can look at the files that are checked in the box below.
To Remove the "linkCreation.dotm" add-in: The "linkCreation.dotm" add-in may cause issues with the EndNote tab from appearing in Word 2016 for Mac. Please update EndNote X7 to version X7.6 to avoid this issue. To update, click on the "EndNote X7" menu and choose "Check for Updates" then follow the on-screen prompts. Alternatively, you can remove the "linkCreation.dotm" add-in. To remove this file, first Quit Word. Click on the Go menu of your Finder and then press the "Option" key on your keyboard. Library should then appear as an option in the Go menu. Click this and browse to "Group Containers:UBF8T346G9.Office:User Content:Startup:Word." Move the "linkCreation.dotm" file out of this folder. You can then start Word 2016 to use the EndNote tools.
To Disable the PayPal Addin, close completely out of Word, and open Control Panel. Select Add/Remove Programs (or Programs and Features in Vista), and go to "Microsoft Office Accounting 2008 PayPal Addin" and choose uninstall.
To disable SnagIt 6 (and some versions of 7), close completely out of Word, open the SnagIt program, and go to "Tools > Program Preferences > Addins" and disable the Word addin.
To disable SnagIt 8 (and some versions of 7), close out of all open programs and go to "Start > Control Panel > Add or Remove Programs", click once on SnagIt from the list of installed programs, and click on the Change button. In the SnagIt Setup box, click Modify, then choose Next. Click the down arrow next to the Word add-in and choose Entire feature will be unavailable. This should remove the SnagIt addin from Word.
To disable Copernic Agent, the conflicting file is named "CopernicAgentExt.dll" and it is NOT located in the Word startup folder. Rather it can be found in the Copernic Agent program folder. Moving this dll file to the desktop and restarting Word should resolve the problem.
To uninstall FlashPaper 2, close completely out of Word and Outlook and browse to "C:\Program Files\Macromedia\Flashpaper 2\". Here, double-click on "UninstallFP.bat" to uninstall FlashPaper 2.
To remove the Contribute 3 plugin, close both Contribute and any Microsoft Office application. Browse to C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Contribute CS3. Rename officeplugin.dll to officeplugin.dllOLD. When you relaunch Word, the Contribute toolbar should be removed.
To add the toolbar again in the future, remove OLD from the file name. Next, bring up the command.exe window and browse to the program's directory C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Contribute CS3\. Run the following command: regsvr32 officeplugin.dll
To remove the Contribute 4 plugin, close both Contribute and any Microsoft Office application. Browse to C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Contribute CS4. Rename officeplugin.dll to officeplugin.dllOLD and OfficePluginRes.dll to OfficePluginRes.dllOLD. When you relaunch Word, the Contribute toolbar should be removed.
To add the toolbar again in the future, remove OLD from both of the file names. Next, bring up the command.exe window and browse to the program's directory C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Contribute CS4\. Run the following command: regsvr32 officeplugin.dll
Then run the following command: regsvr32 OfficePluginRes.dll
To remove ScanSoft/Nuance product addins, you must unregister the .dll files that cause their tools to load in Word. Go to "Start > Run" and type "CMD" (without quotes), then click "OK".
From here, navigate to the PDF Professional folder (typically "C:\Program Files\ScanSoft\PDF Professional Version Number") and type "regsvr32 /u PDFCWordaddin.dll" (without quotes) and press Enter. This should unregister one of the addin components.
Next, navigate from your current location to "PDF Driver\OfficeAddin", and type "regsvr32 /u ZnWordaddin.dll" (without quotes) and press Enter. This should unregister their second addin component, and the EndNote tools should now work within Word.
The PDFCreate menu will likely still be available within Word, you can remove this by going to "Tools > Customize" in Word and simply dragging the PDFCreate menu off the menu bar.
To remove the XML Toolbox for Microsoft Office Word 2003, you need to remove it through the Add or Remove Programs Control Panel. Simply highlight "Microsoft Office Word 2003 XML Toolbox" and click Remove.
To remove the odfaddin.dot, you need to remove it through the Add or Remove Programs (or "Programs" on Vista) Control Panel. Simply highlight "Sun ODF Plugin for Microsoft Office" and click Remove.
In general, the conflicting addin files can be found in Word's startup folder, located at:
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office\Startup (Windows)
Macintosh HD:Applications:Microsoft Office (X or 2004):Office:Startup:Word (macOS)
With Word and Outlook closed (as well as any other programs which may use Word components, such as PowerPoint), browse to this folder and remove the addin file that is causing the conflict. Then start Word again and try using the EndNote tools to see if the problem has been resolved.
In addition to conflicting addin files, this error may be caused if one of EndNote's addin components isn't loading properly in Word. To check this, in Word go to "Tools > Templates and Addins" and make sure that both of the EN#Cwyw files are checked (where "#" is the EndNote version number). If the EN#Cwyw.wll or the EN#Cwyw.WordXP.wll file is not checked here, try checking it and clicking the OK button, and see if you are able to enable the macros.
If the above steps do not resolve your problem and you need to contact us, please include a list of the items in the "Templates and Addins" dialog box in Word, under the "Tools" menu. Also, list which items are checked, and which items are unchecked.
