To be able to create a DDE link over a network, the computer serving as the Network DDE server needs to be setup to provide a NetworkDDE Share to establish a network DDE Channel.
Note: You only have to create a DDE Share if you intend to use DDE between two separate applications running on different machines, and you only have to create the DDE Share on the machine that contains the application which will be the DDE server.
The Windows DDESHARE.EXE utility enables users to manage DDE shares. The 32-bit version is shipped with each Microsoft operating system and is located in the Windows\System32 sub-directory.
To manually launch the DDE Share utility:
When DDEShare.EXE is running, it displays the DDE Share utility window containing two icons which launch the DDE Shares dialog, and the DDE Trusted Shares dialog:
In the DDE Share utility, double-click the left icon (without the check mark) to display the DDE Shares dialog box:
The DDE Shares dialog is used to create, manage, and delete global DDE shares on your computer, and to view the DDE shares of any computer on the network. You can use this dialog to confirm the names of shares available on any machine on the same network. From the DDE Shares menu, select Shares | Select Computer and choose the computer name you're interested in from the list.