How see who edit excel file on a network share

Federico Coppola 1,181 Reputation points
2022-04-11T18:38:23.16+00:00

Hello,
Inside company there is a Windows Server file server with a network share.
Inside this share there are some Microsoft Excel document that many employees edit.
How can I see, via Excel, employees that edited the file?

Many employees complain that they lost this function after that I installed Microsoft Office 365 on their computer.

All computer are running Win 10 21H2.

How can I fix it?
Thanks a lot
Federico

Windows 10
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Excel Management
Excel: A family of Microsoft spreadsheet software with tools for analyzing, charting, and communicating data.Management: The act or process of organizing, handling, directing or controlling something.
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  1. Emily Hua-MSFT 27,526 Reputation points
    2022-04-12T03:23:10.843+00:00

    Hi @Federico Coppola

    > Many employees complain that they lost this function after that I installed Microsoft Office 365 on their computer.

    Do you share the Excel files on your Windows file server via "Shared Workbooks (Leagcy)"?
    If so, you can go to Review tab > Share Workbooks. But please note, in Excel of Microsoft 365 apps, the Share Workbook button has been hidden, users need to unhide it.
    Then on the Editing tab, in the "Who has this workbook open now" list, review the names of users.
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    Any updates, welcome to post back.

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  2. Limitless Technology 39,351 Reputation points
    2022-04-19T07:02:16.787+00:00

    Hi FedericoCoppola-2569,

    Are the Excel documents being edited stored on O365? If so, I suggest that you have all employees use O365 for editing as there are built-in change tracking systems within Excel on O365. Co-Authoring is an excellent system and you can read about it at the link below:

    https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/collaborate-on-excel-workbooks-at-the-same-time-with-co-authoring-7152aa8b-b791-414c-a3bb-3024e46fb104#PickTab=Windows

    If your Excel files are simply shared on a network drive and you can't switch to O365 Co-Authoring or you need older history, by default, Excel keeps the change history for 30 days and permanently erases any change history that is older than this number of days. To keep change history for longer than 30 days, enter a number that is larger than 30. Please see this article:

    https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/track-changes-in-a-shared-workbook-22aea671-cac7-4fa3-845d-eeb23725bd15#:~:text=By%20default%2C%20Excel%20keeps%20the,that%20is%20larger%20than%2030.

    There is also a system called Show Changes within Excel that allows you to view changes if you're using the web version of Excel or O365:

    To see the changes that have been made to a workbook by going to the Review tab. Then click the Show Changes button.

    This will open up a task pane on the right side of the worksheet that has a running list. The list contains all of the changes that have been made in the workbook. Included with each entry is the name of the person who made the change, a timestamp of when the change was made, and a description of what the change was.

    In instances where values were updated, the entry shows what the old value was in addition to the new value. Knowing what the previous value was can be useful in case you need to change it back.

    Click on any of the changes in the list and it will automatically navigate to the cell where the change was made.

    I hope this answers your question.

    --If the reply is helpful, please Upvote and Accept as answer--

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