Stencil editing - Must I "Save As" everytime I edit?

[analogman]

I'm updating a number of shapes in a custom stencil. Every time I open the stencil, I must chose "Save As" in order to edit the masters. The stencil is local to my hard drive. (Not in the cloud or on a network share of any kind.) Is this normal or is there some way I can prevent it from being read only until such time I'm ready to release it?

I might also add that the computer I'm using is locked down pretty tightly. I do not have admin privileges and so I wonder if some security setting might be the cause.

Thanks in advance,
analogman

[Yacine]

You mustn't chose "save as " to edit the masters, but to *save* them.
The problem is that Visio offers two ways to edit stencils.
1) without setting the stencil in edit mode, but you need to "save as"
2) by setting the stencil in edit mode first (right click on stencil and chose edit),  then edit and finaly do a simple save.

[Paul Herber]

There is a reason why you must use "Save As" rather than just "Save". If the stencil is one of Visio's built-in stencils or it is a stencil that has been installed via an installer file then these files are marked as write-protected, so you cannot use plain old Save with these.
Put the stencil into the "My Shapes" folder, you can edit the file easily there.

[analogman]

Thanks folks but something's amiss here. Here's a few facts to set the stage.

1. I'm using Microsoft Visio Professional 2016.
2. I'm editing a custom shape stencil created by my company. It was never one of the built-in stencils and was not installed using an installer.
3. The stencil file is located in "My Shapes" folder.
4. The stencil file does not have the Read Only attribute set when observing its properties with the file explorer.
5. Visio is executing under Windows 10.

When I double click on the stencil file, xxx.vss, it opens up in Visio. Right clicking on a shape I see Edit Master is grayed out. I cannot find anywhere on the stencil where I can right click and chose Edit to put the stencil into edit mode. If I click on File in the toolbar, the Info page shows Save As, Compatibility Mode and Restrict Permissions to this diagram (although restrict permissions is grayed out.) Next to Save As it says, "Read-Only Document - This document has been opened in read-only mode. Changes cannot be made to the original document. To save changes, create a new copy of the document." So all I can do is select "Save As" and save to another filename. Then can I edit the master shapes. I can then save as much as I want until I exit Visio. Once I exit Visio, I'm back to the Read Only problem when I open the stencil again.

I don't understand why it opens as Read Only each time I launch Visio. I would think I'd need to apply some sort of protection when I decide I'm finished making updates. Obviously I can work around this issue but it is annoying and I'm not sure if it is by design or what.

[analogman]

So I just tried a couple of things.

1. If I launch the Visio application first, then open the file using File/Open, I can edit the masters.
2. Rather than double click the stencil file in the File Explorer like I had been doing, if I right click on the file and chose "Edit", it opens up in Visio and I can edit the stencil.

It seems like this is a protection scheme to avoid accidental corrupting of a stencil file. (But what do I know?  )

[Paul Herber]

1. is the correct way to open a stencil for use with a document in Visio.
Double-clicking the stencil opens the stencil in a sort of stencil viewer mode, you can still drop shapes onto the diagram.

[analogman]

Yeah, well in my case at the moment, I'm trying to get the shapes in the stencil and not creating any drawings yet.

Thanks to all who have replied.