Changing Text to Number Problem.

  • Thread starter Thread starter john
  • Start date Start date
J

john

I have a problem when importing information into an Excel spreadsheet.

We have a system at work that has a front end Web based application (asp)
that accesses an SQL database. Not all of the software is written yet, so to
sort/filter data I have to copy lists of information from the Web based
application to an Excel spreadsheet.

Much of the information that I import (copy and paste) into the spreadsheet
are hyperlinks to other information in the SQL database. To get rid of the
hyperlinks once I have the list copied to my spreadsheet, I (copy and paste
special, values only) the information onto another sheet in the workbook.
Here is the problem: When I reformat a column from text to a number so I can
then order the list, the values remain text (i.e., text series: 1, 112, 122,
2, 22, 3 rather than number series: 1, 2, 3, 22, 112, 122). How can I force
the information in the cells to be a number rather than text?

I apologize for being so long-winded, but I was not sure how much
information was needed to get my particular circumstance across.

Any help will be appreciated.



john
 
John,

In an empty cell on your sheet put an 0.
Copy that cell and then select the cells with the "numbers"
Edit / Paste Special / Add.

Succes

--
Regards,
Auk Ales

* Please reply to this newsgroup only *
* I will not react on unsolicited e-mails *
 
Thanks for your help, but I still can not get it work.

It is kind of funny; when I type a 0 into a cell it looks like (0) with the
cell formated to general. When I change the same cell format to be a number
the 0 switches over to look like (0.00), which is what I expected. But when
I do the same to the cells that have the numbers that behave like text they
continue to behave like text.

john
 
I just figured it out!

It turns out that certain lists are coming back with a "space" character at
the end of the number causing the number to look like text, I guess.

Now, is there anyway to quickly remove a "space" character from the end of
"number/word" for a group of cells without having to write a VB routine?



john
 
Use the function Trim

--
Regards,
Auk Ales

* Please reply to this newsgroup only *
* I will not react on unsolicited e-mails *
 
Thanks for all your help.
The " Sub Trimall()" subroutine was the answer. Worked great.
Thanks again.

john
 
Back
Top