MS Office 2011 for Mac Excel Problem

I've used MS Office for Mac 2011 for years, but a new problem cropped up lately. When I open some of my old spreadsheets (that I created & used before many times), they open as read-only. "Get Info" verifies they are NOT locked and they are NOT password protected. If I save as a new name they open okay, but if I delete the old file, the new one then becomes read-only. So I can only use them if the old file is also present (two spreadsheet files for each - ugh!!)

Can anyone help?

I use El Capitan OS 10.11.3

Hmmm. Two ideas.

First, you say you checked the info window and you are read/write enabled as shown at the bottom. Are you sure you are who you think you are and listed specifically in this as read/write. You may wish to try setting everyone to "read/write" temporarily to see if this changes anything. Beside to change this back after you have figured things out.

Secondly, just an off-the-top idea that may not lead anywhere but...

Try setting your system to display hidden files in finder windows. Do this by using terminal. Cut and paste the following instruction as administrator:

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles YES;killall Finder

Then see if there are any "lck" or perhaps "~$" files or other supplementary files left over from running your Excel files that make it appear to the system that someone else has that file open. You should be able to delete these and get back to the way things were. In any event, you may be able to see what the system is doing while you are trying to run your spreadsheets. Careful not to delete any ".*" files.

When done, change the "YES" to a "NO" in your "defaults" terminal command to restore finder windows to not display hidden files, and they will go away.

If you are not an administrator, you may have to run this as a "sudo" command which would be "sudo defaults..."

Hope this helps...OJ

Sure appreciate your taking the time to respond, sailor#1! Whether it was re-installing Microsoft Office, subsequent updates to Office and El Capitan, or just gremlins getting tired of their mischief, the problem seems to have been resolved. At the time, for your info, yes - I was the one signed in (Get Info) and the administrator and the sole user of my computer so the "Read & Write" WAS enabled for all.

For future reference, I have printed out your advice - who knows I may need it again.

Thanks again, OJ ... OJ?? - Hope you're not writing from prison! )

Glad to help. Free as a bird!

viking make sure you are running version 14.6.8 as there have been several El Capitan updates to Office since Cappy was released.