Hi Joseph,

Is it possible to set protection on the entire workbook in one atomic
operation, or do I need to set the protection for each sheet separately, as
I am doing? And is there a more efficient way of setting the appearance
style for every worksheet or must I cycle through them individually as I am
doing?

No, we're pretty much stuck with cycling through them as you're doing.

Anyway, here's my main question: With this approach I am able to lock the
contents of all cells, but this does not lock embedded VBA widgets, e.g.
Checkboxes, Command Buttons, etc. How can I lock these objects as well?

The VBA widgets each have a Locked property, which is independent of the
worksheet protection.

Regards

Stephen Bullen
Microsoft MVP - Excel
www.oaltd.co.uk