Would you please clarify the steps and stages to protect a work sheet.

Dear Jon

Thank you for attending the Excel Intermediate course.

Before you can protect your sheet you need to decide which cells in the worksheet you allow user to enter information and which cells you are not.

This is very important to because if you simply choose Tools > Protection > Protect Sheet… it will simply protect all your cells which means that you‘ll won’t be able to enter any information on any cells.

But if you wanted the users to enter information on certain cells then you have to select them and unlock them. In order to unlock the cells you have to select Format > Cells… and then choose the Protection tab. In eth protection tab uncheck the Locked.

This will unlock all the cells that you had chosen before you clicked on Format > Cells….

Once you have performed the above mentioned steps then you have to choose Tools > Protection > Protect Sheet…

There are various things that you can do here. You can put a password (which is highly recommendable).

You can also give individual rights to the user to either insert/delete rows/columns, Format cells such as change the colour or size of the fonts, etc..

NB: Some times people might not be able to type information on the locked cells but they can copy and paste cells into another worksheet which can be a security issue.

You can prevent this by un-checking the locked cells when you get to the Tools > Protection. Protect Sheet Dialogue box.


Hope I have been successful in answering your question.

Kindest Regards

Rajeev Rawat
MOS Master Instructor 2000/2003