Shared Workbook Access?

  • Thread starter Thread starter darknailblue
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darknailblue

Hi... we have a work log at work (obviously) and I was wondering if i
is at all possible to set up the workbook so each individual user ca
edit in his/her assigned worksheet ONLY!! Ideal scenario I want i
that we can all edit this shared file but only edit our assigne
worksheet (designated by our name) and only see our deginated workshee
and not everyone elses. The global editing priviledge for all users i
starting to cause problems such as people not paying attention an
entering work on other people's sheets or psycho people deleting othe
people's work and whatever else could possibly occur.

If its possible to set something up like that would it also be possibl
to have someone with 'administrative' priviledges edit and view th
entire content of the workbook so that they can for instance prin
reports on our daily and weekly totals or whatever else they need t
do?

~darknail

esteemed n00
 
In principle it should be fairly easy to do something like that by looking at
the currently logged in user name, and then hiding all the worksheets except
those that a particular user needs.
If I was writing this application I would use the following procedure to to
what you want.

1. Create the workbook you want, and hide all the sheets.
2. Put some code in an Auto_exec macro that checks for the current user name.
3. When the current user name is known, unhide only the worksheets they need.
4. On the Workbook close event hide all sheets again.

There is a small piece of code on my website at www.nwarwick.co.uk that will
get the user name for you.

Points to note are:
1. Only one user can use the workbook at anyone time - if you need
simultaneous multi-user access then a database such as MS Access will
probably be better.
2. There is still nothing to stop people entering eroneous data.
3. The whole thing will totally fall down if the user has 'High' macro
security or chooses not to run macros.
4. You will need to consider locking out ant menu bar entries that might
allow users to by bypass your security.

That should give you some things to work on / think about for a while

Neil
www.nwarwick.co.uk
 
We unfortunately don't have Access... Do you think it might be easier t
have everyone use their own seperate workbooks and then have anothe
workbook that would compile everyone's data together
 
One thing I am not clear on: If I have a workbook that has multi-user
access that we are using right now, why wouldn't it be able to be used
by more than one person if the hiding of other sheets were implemented?
Does it have to do with the fact that whenever someone closes the
workbook and saves their work that the macro would unhide all the
windows? Therefore effecting everyone elses computers and unhiding all
the windows on everyone elses screen?
 
I would suggest that you explore your suggestion of different Workbooks for
each user and then a master workbook that links to them and extracts all the
relevant data and produces any reports etc you need.

Excel doesn't have the ability to perform record locking as Access does, so
only one user at a time can have write access to a workbook. So if a second
user opens the book then a message is displayed telling them that they only
have 'read only' access (Try getting two people to open your current book at
the same time and you will see what I mean)

The Multi-workbook option will work for you much better, just remeber that
you need to have all books on a network drive not held locally otherwise all
user will need to leave their PC's permanently switched on.

HTH

Neil
www.nwarwick.co.uk
 
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