Excel 2003 data sort

[seafms]

I have a long list of books that I update often. Between authors I have blank
lines. When I do a data sort the blank lines drop to the bottom of the list.
I want the blank lines to remain in place between each author. The data sort
worked on a prior version of Excel, but not on Excel 2003.

 

[Shane Devenshire]

Hi,

The sort command has always worked by moving the blanks to the bottom, this
is not a feature of 2003.

The solution is to either create a dummy column to control the sort order or
to fill in the blank rows with the item above and formatting it to not be
visible.

Dummy column method:
1. Suppose the column you are sorting on, with the alternating blank rows,
is column A with titles on row 1. In an adjacent blank column enter the
following formula and copy it down as far as necessary:
=IF(A2="",A1,A2)
2. With the formulas selected press Ctrl+C (copy), choose Edit, Paste
Special, Values.
3. Use this column to control your sort.