Getting Rid of Workbook Links

Paula has a workbook that is linked to other workbooks. These are workbook links, not hyperlinks. She is looking for a way to break all of these types of links.

There are several ways you can approach such a task. One is to manually break the links by choosing Links from the Edit menu (in Excel 2007 you click the Office button, click Prepare, and then click Edit Links to File) and then selecting all the links and clicking Break Link. You can even select all the links at once by creating a selection set (using Shift and Ctrl to compose the set) prior to clicking on Break Link.

If you prefer not to use the manual method, you can use a short macro to get rid of the links. The following is one example that will do the task:

Sub BreakLinks()
    Dim strLink
    For Each strLink In ActiveWorkbook.LinkSources
        ActiveWorkbook.BreakLink Name:=CStr(strLink), _
          Type:=xlExcelLinks
    Next strLink
End Sub

A third way to manage your links is to look to a third-party solution, such as FindLink or Name Manager. You can find them at the following page:

http://www.bmsltd.co.uk/MVP/

FindLink was written by Bill Manville and Name Manager by Jan Karel Pieterse, both Excel MVPs.