Forum Discussion
AutoSave feature causing frustration
HI Marli van Staden.
First of all, before editing the registry be EXTREMELY careful!
If you make a mistake you can render the machine unusable.
(You should also make a backup of the registry before modifying it.)
All this said, if you want to try, you have to ADD the "DontAutoSave" key inside "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Excel". The key type should be DWORD and its value should be 1.
Also, as an introduction to editing the registry, you can give a look to https://www.howtogeek.com/school/using-windows-admin-tools-like-a-pro/lesson5/
Hope it helps...
There are more problems. We have files online that already existed before this feature was introduced, but where we made sure the "Thisworkbook.autosaveon" flag was set to false. But any new user that opens the file will somehow ignore this feature and it gets turned on again by Excel.
Worse, I experimented with using vba code to programmatically turn off autosave the moment a workbook is opened, but somehow excel manages to already save before the user has had a chance to press the "enable macros" button. >.>
How do I permanently disable this feature for all users accessing my files in SharePoint, not just for myself?
https://support.office.com/en-us/article/what-it-administrators-should-know-about-autosave-88e0f80f-e5ea-441b-9c5a-259f08490ae7
Adam
Hello Adam,
Problem is I'm not an admin, not would I want to turn it off for all excel files everywhere - just for the excel files I created that other users work with. I had hoped it'd be as easy as simply setting the workbook.autosaveon flag to "False", but no such luck. Is there any other way I can turn off autosave when another user opens my workbooks, before the file is first auto-saved? (which is before the user clicks on "Enable macro's" apparently)
- Well, I get it! It’s a very different way of thinking and working! But as said you can try set the document as read only when opened! I would suggest trying to adjust though! There’s benefits as well and remember that you have version history for recovery in case of misshappenings!!
AdamHello Adam,
I looked at that option as well, but if I set the files to read-only, the built-in macro's won't be able to write to the files when they should, either - and apart from the effort required to update the macro's contained in several hundreds of files, I cannot do so without the datestamp on those files getting changed.
I just hope there's a workaround - the files already contain a macro that immediately saves the files locally as soon as the user makes any changes, and only transfers the changes to the online version when they press the button to do so.
If the files were already saved online prior to that macro being triggered (or macro's being enabled at all by the user pressing 'enable macro's'), I would need to have the macro undo the unwanted auto-save by restoring the last version in sharepoint that wasn't autosaved after the opened file was stored locally (or is closed online without changes)
Is that possible, to find and restore an old version in SharePoint using vba?
I really disliked the Autosave at first. Now I am on the fence.
I still get pissed off when I see a bunch of files that I know I haven't changed in 5 years with last modified dates in last month but I mostly avoid that happening now.
It may just be that a few process changes will make it usable and maybe even an improvement. I have found it helps to protect files and choose read only (File, Protect Document, Always Open Read-Only). That way you, or someone else, has to consciously choose if you want to save the file.
John Twohig I am so HUGELY pissed at microsoft for the poor implementation of autosave - sending millions of users to change habits (open as read-only, etc.) which is virtually IMPOSSIBLE to enforce. We have lost an incredibly important feature of he windows explorer, namely, the "Last Modified" field has lost all meaning. It used to be that I could tell which file was the latest to be updated. Now, as soon as someone opens a file just to read it, the "Last modified" date gets updated. SHAME ON YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!! You should have thought of a way to preserve this critical piece of information that millions of users use every single day when looking at our work.
