characters around numbers

[ellie]

I'm trying to add bracket characters around numbers without
altering the number.

E.g. a cell contains the number 20, but I want the cell to
display (20). But when I type in the brackets and press
enter, the number becomes -20. How can I get round this
and keep the bracket characters intact?

Also i want to do calculations on the numbers e.g. a cell
contains (20), another cell contains (5), and i want a third
cell to display the sum of the two numbers with bracket
characters around the answer i.e. (25). Is it possible to do this?

Many thanks for any help

P.S. I've found the help files with the program minimal, can anyone
recommend a good learning resource for Excel?

 

[Peo Sjoblom]

precede the entry with an apostrophe, change to text format before entering,
note that it will be text

 

[Barb Reinhardt]

It doesn't make sense why you'd want to do this, but try format custom
"("0")"

 

[Dave Peterson]

Maybe using a custom format (format|cells|number tab|custom category) of:

"("General")"

Or
"("General")";"("-General")";"("0")";@

Depending on what should happen to real negative numbers:

-(20)
or
(-20)

Debra Dalgleish has a list of books at her site:
http://www.contextures.com/xlbooks.html

And there are lots of web sites available--but it would kind of depend on the
level you need.

http://j-walk.com/ss/help/index.htm
http://contextures.com/tiptech.html

And lots more....