Is there a way to read from an Excel file while its open?

[Reeza]

We have a data sheet that many employees enter daily and we'd like to read the excel spreadsheet.
Unfortunately sometimes people have it open when we want to read it, so besides sending out mass emails asking someone to close the file is there a way to read the file while it is open.

I was able to write a libname statement to connect to the file, but then it wouldn't read the data.

I'm on SAS 9.2, Windows XP and Excel 2010.

[OS2Rules]

Hi:

We have exactly the same problem.  I think the solution was to issue a DOS COPY for the Excel file to some other (perhaps temporary) location and read that file.

If I remember, the DOS COPY will read the file even is someone leaves it open.

Just remember, if that user saves something new to the spreadsheet, you will not see that change.