2007 -- what's up with this # 1?

  • Thread starter Thread starter JR
  • Start date Start date
J

JR

Moving from 2003 (and previous versions) to 2007 is a real pain in the neck.

Latest glitch is this ....

I have serial number consisting of numbers that are NOT Numbers, but Excell
treats them as numbers.

In older versions all I had to do was format the cells as "text" and add a '
before the series of numbers and they didn't get written in scientific
notation.

Now that just doesn't work.

How do I get 1234567899999 to not come in as 1.23457E+12?
 
It works the same way.

Preformat the cell as text, then do the data entry.

Or start the entry with an apostrophe.

You don't need to do both in any version of excel.
 
Nope, doesn't work -- as I said the "numbers" show up in scientific notation,
not as text, so you can not read them the way you are intended to read them.
 
Did you format the cell as text before you typed them in?

Did you start your data entry with an apostrophe?
 
Hi,

there is no change in behaviour in this area between 2003 and 2007.

Either
1. type '1234567899999
note the apostrophy
2. format the cell to TEXT first and then enter the number.

You do not need to do both.

Cheers,
Shane Devenshire
 
Hi - I am having the same problem. Perhaps it could be clarified - I am
importing a text file using VB macros. This data is from an Oracle database,
and imported on a daily basis.

I am not entering the data manually, so I don't have the option of
pre-formatting the cell or entering an apostrophe first.

The long numbers, which used to be ok in Excel 2003, now get displayed in
scientific notiation, which is not what the users want. Once the numbers are
imported, I can see that the "data" is really there if I convert the format
of all cells in the column to NUMBER. But some of them are not numbers, some
have an alpha attached. So now, they don't sort right, because the "numbers"
sort differently than the "text" in the column.

This could be solved if I could tell Excel to completely skip scientific
notation for this spreadsheet. That would be a nice option - is it available?
 
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