I was sent an Excel sheet and when you open it, it has current account data in it. The person that sent it to me swears that she hasn't touched it in months so it has to be updating it's data from somewhere. How do I see where it's updating from? It doesn't seem to be a link that I know about. I know how to choose a datasourse and when you open the excel sheet it asks if you want to update but this sheet doesn't do that. It just looks like a normal Excel sheet except it does have some weird grouping. Any ideas?

In excel 2007, you could go to the Data tab and click Connections. that's for an actual DATA CONNECTION.

You can also just review the cells. Do they contain formulas that essentially read data from another workbook? That's a link.

such as:

='C:\reports\workbook2.xlsx'!A2

Also, whether a workbook asks you if you want to update external links when you open it depends on several other unrelated factors. Such as your Trust Center Settings as well as workbook-specific settings under Data > Links.

I have an option to go to existing connections but it tells me there are no connections to this workbook found.

Then could be formulas? Can you paste an example of the actual content of a cell, that contains 'current data' ?

Also, try right-clicking on this "live" sort of data, and see if your right-click context contains any mention of a Query or Table. A worksheet can save a query definition. Some people are REALLY into that....I'm not....too much of this (too much hidden/behind the scenes stuff happening - like setting query Properties in access)

I'm not seeing any formulas or any reference to a data source when I right click. I'm starting to wonder if this is some kind of report...

The only other thing I can think of (unless you can zip and upload it, or even PM it to me, which would be very helpful for the purpose of this thread), is of course someone may have used VBA to automate data going into it from another application (then saving/closing it), or coming into it.

That would pretty much place data in the workbook, without leaving any residual traces like data connections, query tables, links, etc.

Which is exactly what I often do...

If you're able to zip and upload it, or enough of a sample to check it out, that would be great.

I wish I could share it but it's senstitive data and against my company's policy.

So, I did alt F11 and opened the code window and I see in the properties that under UpdateLinks, 1 - xlUpdateLinksUserSetting is seleted. I don't see any vba code though. I also see ****** in the password and write password sections. Does this tell you anything?

I can't think of anything that info really reveals. If you see no vba code anywhere, and you've done everything else I've suggested, I'm out of ideas. Sorry

Maybe let it sit for a while and do a 'stakeout' - if it moves, pounce on it and demand information!! It will either update or it won't.