The same applies when you hide formulas in Excel. Note: As mentioned earlier, a cell that has not been locked cannot be protected. Now, when the user selects a cell that has a formula and is locked, he/she will not be able to see the formula in the formula bar.
This will open the format cells dialog box. Press Control + 1 (hold the control key and then press 1).This will select all the cells that have formulas in it. Here are the steps to hide formulas in locked cells: While this isn’t an issue in most cases, but if you don’t want the formula to be visible, you need to hide it. However, if that cell is selected, the formula in the cell would be visible in the formula bar. When you lock formulas in Excel, the user can’t make any changes to the cells with formulas. If the user tries to change the cells, he/she will get a prompt as shown below: Once you are done with the above four steps, all the cells that have formulas would be locked, and the user wouldn’t be able to change anything in it. In the Protect Sheet dialog box, make sure the option ‘Protect worksheet and contents of the locked cells’ is checked.Here are the steps to protect the worksheet: Now that the ‘Locked’ property is enabled for cells with formulas (and not for other cells), protecting the entire worksheet would only restrict access to the cells with formulas. With the cells with formulas selected, press Control + 1 (hold the Control key and then press 1).Here are the steps to Lock Cells with Formulas: Once we do this, protecting the worksheet would lock these cells that have formulas, but not the other cells. Now that we have selected the cells with formulas, we need to go back and lock these cells (enable the lock property that we disabled in step 1). This would select all the cells that have formulas in it. In the Go To Special dialog box, select Formulas.From the drop-down, select Go to Special.Go to Home and within the Editing group, click on Find & Select.
Select all the cells in the worksheet (use Control + A).Here are the steps to select all the cells that have formulas: To do this, we need to first select all the cells with formulas. Now that all the cells have been unlocked, we need to make sure that the cells that have formulas are locked. Step 2: Select All the Cells that Have Formulas In the format cells dialog box, select the Protection tab.Use the keyboard shortcut Control + 1 (hold the Control key and then press 1).Select all the cells in the worksheet (use the keyboard shortcut Control + A).Here are the steps to unlock all the cells: To do this, we first need to unlock all the cells and then select and lock only those cells that have formulas in it. If all the cells are locked, and I protect the entire worksheet, it would mean a user can’t change anything.īut we only want to lock (restrict access) to the cells that have formulas in it. While you may find it confusing, bear with me and keep reading.Īs I mentioned, only the cells that are locked as well as protected can truly be restricted.
#Excel this file is locked for editing mac how to
Now that I have outlined the steps above, let’s dive in and see how to do this (and more importantly, why we must do this): Step 1: Select All the Cells and Unlock it Select all the cells that have formulas (using Go To Special).Here are the steps to lock formulas in Excel (explained in detail later on): This also means that if a cell is not locked and you protect it, the user would be able to make changes. Only when you protect the locked cells can you truly restrict the user from making changes. For example, if you’re sending a workbook to your manager for review, you may want to allow him to add his comments or change some cells.Ī better workaround to this is to lock only those cells that have formulas in it.īy default, all the cells are locked in Excel. However, doing this would prevent the user from making any changes to the worksheet. One of the ways to prevent this from happening is to lock the worksheet and all the cells. The chances of such errors increase multifold when you share a file with colleagues or managers or clients. But if you are not, it may lead to some erroneous results.Īnd let me tell you this, errors in Excel have cost millions to companies (read this or this). Now you’ll be lucky if you’re able to spot the error and correct it.
#Excel this file is locked for editing mac full
You are going through a worksheet full of formulas, and you accidentally hit the delete key, or backspace key, or some other number/alphabet key. While this makes it convenient to create formulas in Excel, it comes with a few disadvantages as well. You can easily edit a formula through the formula bar or directly in the cell. Watch Video – How to Lock Formulas in ExcelĮxcel formulas are easy to create and edit in Excel.
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