AutoSave switch greyed-out.

Thanks Bruce,

I've tested the auto-save, not the one-drive version, and no files are stored on my hard-drive and do not get found when I restart the applications (Word or Excel) after a failure or force-close of the apps after using them for 30 to 45 minutes, "auto-save" is set to 5 minutes in the applications.

I have class in a few minutes, so I will need to check this out later, but I believe these are actually two different resources.  When "autosave" is grayed out, locally one is still getting a save every X minutes.  Again, I will have to check that to be sure.  It will be several hours until I can do that....

Want to get rid of Autosave?  Then go to Feedback Hub and upvote the topic I just posted there. That is the way to get Microsoft to actually take notice. (You'd think they would pay attention in these forums also, but apparently they don't.)

In Feedback Hub, search for this topic by typing some or all of the summary title in the Summarize-your-issue box: "Autosave is redundant, confusing, and useless. And it doesn't work. Delete this feature."

Once finding it, upvote it.  Feel free to add comments there as well.  Apparently activity there counts more than activity here.  Dumb, but that's Microsoft for ya.

(I just posted it - may take a while to show up there.)

Hi Bruce.. 

Thank you for the response but I'm not actually after removing the auto-save feature.  I have had it save my work about 6 times over the past 20 yrs and those were great saves when it worked.  The simplicity of searching your device for the ~files and knowing where to look when you elect not to use the recovery file was always a big value.  Now its not where users expect it or saved how users expect.

Forcing us into manually remembering to save a document that may be several tens of pages long, while a no-brainer from an editing standpoint is not a work-process "feature", it is a barrier to continuous workflow. 

I'm sure I'm preaching to the choir and I think, based on your feedback you get it.

I sincerely appreciate the value "auto-save" provides (primarily for folks who don't work off of mobile devices and laptops) when an unexpected failure causes a CPU to scramble or power to go out.  That is why the feature was put in service in the late 80' in the first place.

What has happened with the Office365 implementation is moving it from auto-save on a local or optionally cloud sync location, to only a cloud-sync location is counter-productive.  When we had 1000 office users switched over to the company Office 365 implementation we had continuous trouble with auto-save pushing to the cloud incorrectly, or not at all and also NOT leaving any remnant files on the actual PC's.  It is a much bigger problem than I think is realized given many users just get frustrated that Microsoft is tone deaf on some issue.

I'll definitely go look to provide feedback on the application hub (which I've already done btw and it never hurts to do it more than once.)

Autosave is NOT Autorecover.  Autorecover has been around for 10+ years.  Autosave is a redundant feature that only works with OneDrive - when it works at all.  It is also confusing as it has a similar name to Autorecover.  Autorecover should do it all - whether in the cloud or on the local hard drive. 

Autosave is confusing, redundant, broken, and therefore useless.  Just get rid of it.

I agree Bruce, Auto-save and Auto-recover are not the same thing; they are closely related, but not "the same thing".

Again, I realize this is a community thread and the issue is understanding the new Auto-Save raised on the top-bar of the application and the performance of the auto-save features of the applications.

Back to your point, there may be a naming convention issue with how this is posted and developed. 

Within each of the applications in the prefences or general settings (or the save settings for the app) there have been save features to Auto-Save your work set on a managed time interval (0 to ?? minutes).  This feature has been in the applications for as long as current versions have been sold and used (90's). This auto-save setting was used in the auto-recovery process when the application started back up and recognized the file wasn't "properly closed".   The app would look to the location of the "auto-saved" files, pull up the most recent version for the application and present it to the user, that is essentially the "auto-recovery" process.  This set of auto-save and auto-recover features have been around a long time only now it seems to only work for one-drive if you use an Office 365 install.  

As of note: I also have the desktop versions of the 2016 Project Professional and Visio and both have the "auto-save" setting set within the general settings and both perform exactly as they are expected to perform.  These are not Office 365 versions but the 2016 desktop versions of the software.  This tells me clearly there is an Office 365 distribution issue.

A point more than one of us have noted is the "new" raised auto-save feature is not doing its job for anyone unless and only uless they use one-drive and the other "auto-save" setting within the application IS NOT WORKING at all whether you use one-drive or not.  So neither of the "features" work.

And yes, I realize this is not the support forum but a community forum, and other users need to know that both of the features are not working unless they use one-drive, and only if they use one-drive does one of the features work with some consistency.

Want to get rid of Autosave?  Then go to Feedback Hub and upvote the topic I just posted there. That is the way to get Microsoft to actually take notice. (You'd think they would pay attention in these forums also, but apparently they don't.)

In Feedback Hub, search for this topic by typing some or all of the summary title in the Summarize-your-issue box: "Autosave is redundant, confusing, and useless. And it doesn't work. Delete this feature."

Once finding it, upvote it.  Feel free to add comments there as well.  Apparently activity there counts more than activity here.  Dumb, but that's Microsoft for ya.

(I just posted it - may take a while to show up there.)

Hi Bruce.. 

Thank you for the response but I'm not actually after removing the auto-save feature.  I have had it save my work about 6 times over the past 20 yrs and those were great saves when it worked.  The simplicity of searching your device for the ~files and knowing where to look when you elect not to use the recovery file was always a big value.  Now its not where users expect it or saved how users expect.

Forcing us into manually remembering to save a document that may be several tens of pages long, while a no-brainer from an editing standpoint is not a work-process "feature", it is a barrier to continuous workflow. 

I'm sure I'm preaching to the choir and I think, based on your feedback you get it.

I sincerely appreciate the value "auto-save" provides (primarily for folks who don't work off of mobile devices and laptops) when an unexpected failure causes a CPU to scramble or power to go out.  That is why the feature was put in service in the late 80' in the first place.

What has happened with the Office365 implementation is moving it from auto-save on a local or optionally cloud sync location, to only a cloud-sync location is counter-productive.  When we had 1000 office users switched over to the company Office 365 implementation we had continuous trouble with auto-save pushing to the cloud incorrectly, or not at all and also NOT leaving any remnant files on the actual PC's.  It is a much bigger problem than I think is realized given many users just get frustrated that Microsoft is tone deaf on some issue.

I'll definitely go look to provide feedback on the application hub (which I've already done btw and it never hurts to do it more than once.)

Autosave is NOT Autorecover.  Autorecover has been around for 10+ years.  Autosave is a redundant feature that only works with OneDrive - when it works at all.  It is also confusing as it has a similar name to Autorecover.  Autorecover should do it all - whether in the cloud or on the local hard drive. 

Autosave is confusing, redundant, broken, and therefore useless.  Just get rid of it.