Excel - file in use pop up

[RickyStrapp]

Hi all I have created a process where members of a team can save an excel document document directly in to a sharepoint folder. This list of documents in that folder forms the queue to be worked, and as the process moves on each excel document in the folder is opened, and the data gathered leading to other subsequent actions. The issue i'm having though is that if that person leaves the excel document open on their screen when the process runs (which happens fairly regularly), the Exbel vbo gets stuck in the code stage of the open workbook due to an Excel pop up, which states that the file is in use. The process moves on if I manually click the pop up, however this defeats the purpose. I can think of 3 potential ways around this, 1) If I could check that the file was locked prior to opening the document that would solve my problem, unfortunately the document appears to need to be open in the Excel instance to check if its read only, which obviously doesn't happen due to the pop up 2) If I could get Blue Prism to force itself forward into a recovery stage that would also work 3) If Blue Prism could handle the pop up in its code stage Any guidance about how to solve this issue would be appreciated. Thanks

[Denis__Dennehy]

My recommendation is to always design your solution so that what you are describing is not possible. Your Blue Prism solution should have it's own network folder where it picks the Excel file up from, rather than using the same folder as manual workers which gives the risk of the file being in-use. What you describe, Blue Prism somehow unlocking the file, is risky because the manual user may be correcting or removing an item which they do not want Blue Prism to load - they may be some thing valid that should not be ignored. If a seperate folder is used than the manual team will move the folder into it when the file is ready and there is no risk of the file being locked (because excel would not allow someone to move the location of a locked file).