Can't save documents to OneDrive on my MacBook

We've had a few instances whereby students have reported that they are unable to save files such as Word documents to their University OneDrive. This can include saving to individual folders and the Desktop, depending on how you have OneDrive set up. It says things like you don't have permission to save your files in this location. It's often discovered when trying to save attachments from emails.

The solution has normally been to restart your Mac! On bringing it to the Computer Office, we've advised the student to restart and it all starts working. The problem is caused by the software managing OneDrive crashing after a while, possibly due to memory issues or interacting with other software.

If you have this issue, try and save your files where possible and restart your Mac. If you can't save the file, you could try saving it to a USB key. Unfortunately, if you can't save the file, you may lose some work but as you have OneDrive enabled, hopefully the autosave function will mean you don't lose too much.

The final piece of advice we would give is to restart your Mac periodically, say at least once a week. It's better to restart it when you don't have any problems!

As always, you can visit us in S7 on the second floor if you'd like us to go through it with you.