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Forum Discussion
How to autosave an excel file to Dropbox every 10 min
I just spent two hours on an excel file only to have excel crash before i saved it and lost my work. I am using MS Excel 97-2004 on a MacBook Pro and right now have to manually save all work. How ...
Hello slstewart249
There isn't a way for Dropbox to do this but as I understand it there is an auto-save feature in Microsoft Excel. I believe most versions have this. Take a look at this article https://support.office.com/en-us/article/use-autosave-and-autorecover-to-help-protect-your-files-in-case-of-a-crash-551c29b1-6a4b-4415-a3ff-a80415b92f99
or https://www.justanswer.com/computer/1ay5s-turn-off-autosave-feature-excel.html
Hopes this helps
Chris_J
Super User
Super UserHello slstewart249
There isn't a way for Dropbox to do this but as I understand it there is an auto-save feature in Microsoft Excel. I believe most versions have this. Take a look at this article https://support.office.com/en-us/article/use-autosave-and-autorecover-to-help-protect-your-files-in-case-of-a-crash-551c29b1-6a4b-4415-a3ff-a80415b92f99
or https://www.justanswer.com/computer/1ay5s-turn-off-autosave-feature-excel.html
Hopes this helps
Chris,
The problem is that Excel automatically turns off (and greys out) the auto-save function when saving to Dropbox. So there's no way to enable auto-save when saving to Dropbox.
Is anyone at Dropbox aware of this issue and working with Microsoft to resolve?
It's possible Microsoft does this to encourage people to save to OneDrive instead of Dropbox.
- Rich
Super User II
D L.5 wrote:
The problem is that Excel automatically turns off (and greys out) the auto-save function when saving to Dropbox. So there's no way to enable auto-save when saving to Dropbox.
If you're referring to auto-saving directly to your Dropbox account then it's very likely that Microsoft prevents that as a way to force OneDrive use. There are even topics on Microsoft's forums that discuss this, and the usual answer is to use OneDrive.
However, the auto-save feature just needs a folder on your computer, and you can easily specify your local Dropbox folder. Any files that are auto-saved to the Dropbox folder are then synced like any other file would be. I have my local Dropbox specified as the auto-save location in Excel and it's never been an issue.
Hey
A bit after the event, but MS appears to have removed the "File, Save, Options" functions from the menu now and no comparable Option in "Preferences" on the Macbook - anyone know where this function has been moved to to permit Customising where MS Files can be saved to know other than in OneDrive (which sucks for long file names)?
Thanks Rich. Your solution seemed perfect... unfortunately, it didn't change anything. The AutoSave switch is still greyed out.
- RichThen I'd suggest that there's something else preventing it. The Dropbox folder is just a folder like any other. Can you select a folder elsewhere on your computer?
How do I get to the page where I can customized workbooks are saved and select a folder? I can't find how to get to a page that looks like the screenshot below. Thanks
slstewart249 wrote:
How do I get to the page where I can customized workbooks are saved and select a folder? I can't find how to get to a page that looks like the screenshot below. Thanks
Click on "File" (in the upper left) => "Options" => "Save"
I think your hypothesis is correct. Microsoft Word will also not autosave anywhere except to Onedrive or Sharepoint.
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