Network Access to a PDF File - How To Prevent

[skinfreak]

We have an Excel converted PDF on the network. We used a PDF as users tend to print off copies and this is costing us a small forest every week.

There are problems with updating this file as users have a tendancy to keep the file open after they have viewed it which means that it cannot be updated. Does permitting readonly access to that folder from user accounts prevent a user from locking the file from update? Is there an alternative?

We use pdfMachine to convert the spreadsheet mainly because we disable printing/copying of the pdf and its free. I couldn't seem to find a solution to prevent printing in Excel unfortunately.

Ideas would be greatfully recieved!

 

[rjp]

You can prevent user's from printing the workbook, put the following code in 'ThisWorkbook':

Private Sub Workbook_BeforePrint(Cancel As Boolean)

    MsgBox "Printing has been disabled for this workbook.", , "Alert"

    Cancel = True

End Sub

As for the file locking question, that may well depend upon the server's network file system but I would still expect the file to be locked.

 

[skinfreak]

Its a windows 2003 network i think....oh poo! Solve one problem and another rears it's ugly head.