The title said it all.
Is it possible to distribute Word-documents and open them with word in stead of word, embeded in a browser window?
Great, Microsofties, always there to help you where you don't want that
Don't bother about the registrykey, I'm feeling already quite comfortable in that jungle.
Koen, you may also want to check the use of a flash player embedded in a html page. With the flash "getURL" command, you can open a file on the client computer. Of course you need to know the full path of the word .exe file.
Client computer will be warned by browser about the local file launch attempt. This is something someone may dislike.