How to Protect a Sheet or a Cell

provided by

the OpenOffice.org Documentation Project

Protection of a Sheet
Protection of a cell
Credits

1. Protection of a Sheet

To write-protect all of the cells of a sheet, you have to do the following:

Select Tools-Protect Document from the Menu Bar,
if you choose Sheet..., only your current sheet will be protected from writing,
If you choose Document..., your whole document (workbook) will be protected.

You are not obliged to enter a password, you can simply click on the OK button to close the dialog window without typing anything. However, if you choose a password, it will be requested every time you wish to modify the cells or the sheet.

To eliminate the protection, choose Tools-Protect Document again and deselect the Sheet... or Document... option, eventually typing the password you have set, when requested.

2. Protection of a cell or of a cells group inside a document

Select a range or all the cells of your sheet, with CTRL+A or by clicking the gray rectangle between the rows and columns headings,
In the Format menu, select Cell and from the dialog window that will appear, switch to the Cell Protection tab,
Deselect the check box called Protected (the cells are protected by default),
Then select the cells you wish to protect,
From the Menu bar choose Tools-Protection-Sheet...,
By choosing Format -Cell and by checking the Protected check box again, it will protect the selected cells.

3. Credits

Author: Sophie Gautier

Translation: Gianluca Turconi

Thanks to: Richard Holt, proofreader and OOo contributor

Integration by: Gianluca Turconi

Last modified: 24 February, 2002