Protection & standalone

[Cam]

Hi,

I have a couple of questions which are way beyond my basic knowledge....

What is the best way to protect a worksheet for distribution? Serial no. per user?

Is it possible to export a spreadsheet as a standalone application?

Thanks in advance, Cam.

[dominicb]

Good morning Cam

(1) It all depends on what you mean by protection. No form of Excel protection cannot be cracked - it depends on what you're trying to prtect and from whom. Be a bit more specific if you need more help on this issue.

(2) No. An Excel file can only be read by Excel. If the person at the other end doesn't have Excel, they can use Excel Reader (free from Microsoft) but all they can do is look at the spreadsheet - you'd probably be better off sending it as .pdf if no changes are required.

HTH

DominicB

[Cam]

Hi Dominic,

Thanks for your reply, I didn't know about excel viewer - I will have a look. My spreadsheet has one value to enter so I guess it will not work in this case but I can think of a few other instances where it would be great.

On protection - it would be to ensure that information that I released in an Excel file was really only accessible by the person I sent it to. So, if they then forwarded it on to 'Anne Other'.... she would not have access.... hope that makes sense?

Cheers,

Cam.

[Dave Peterson]

Excel's protection isn't made for security. I think most just consider it a way
to stop users from making bad mistakes (overwriting formulas or deleting sheets
that they shouldn't).

If a user can open your workbook, then everything is available to that user.

In fact, if you give the workbook a nice password to open, there are sites that
can break that protection, too.

Cam wrote:
>
> Hi Dominic,
>
> Thanks for your reply, I didn't know about excel viewer - I will have a
> look. My spreadsheet has one value to enter so I guess it will not work
> in this case but I can think of a few other instances where it would be
> great.
>
> On protection - it would be to ensure that information that I released
> in an Excel file was really only accessible by the person I sent it to.
> So, if they then forwarded it on to 'Anne Other'.... she would not have
> access.... hope that makes sense?
>
> Cheers,
>
> Cam.
>
> --
> Cam
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Cam's Profile: http://www.excelforum.com/member.php...o&userid=27836
> View this thread: http://www.excelforum.com/showthread...hreadid=474057

--

Dave Peterson

[Cam]

Oh well.....

Thanks Dave