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Protecting an excel sheet from printing or downloading from Google Drive

  • Here is a question for you guys. (I hope you can help)
    I want to be able to share an excel file on Google Drive with my students so they can edit it, but don’t want them to be able to print it or download it. Is there a way I can achieve that? If not, is there an alternative service that you suggest using?

    Thanks much in advance

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
  • I’m pretty sure the answer is no. I don’t know about other services but in most editing is considered a higher lever permission than printing or downloading so I’m guessing that you won’t have any luck there either. And remember that anything you let people see on the screen can be turned into an image file and saved or printed with a screenshot tool.

    You didn’t give the reason why you want this feature, perhaps with that other suggestions are possible. If you just need students to input data and don’t want them to see the results then it sounds like you want a form. That is something that you can do with a Google Doc.
    Best,
    Chris

    Thanks Much for your response.
    This is a specific spreadsheet I use for class work. Essentially, students inputs data to 12 different sheets of one workbook, throughout the semester and in the end they are graded upon their participation.
    While getting them to input data is easy using Google docs, preventing them from downloading or printing is important, since we do not want the students to share the work with other students.
    Yes, they can go to lengths using a screen capture, but I am willing to take the chance.

    As Chris mentioned, google forms could be useful for you. Student submits own data via the form, but all the data end up in one spreadsheet for you. If you want separate sheets, you’ll have to create a separate form to collect each sheet’s data. That also means that you’ll have a separate workbook for each form, but you can copy/move them all into one workbook at the end.

    Thanks Much for your response Ruru. Will look into it. Best

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