Strange cell behaviour

[capitan]

We are trying to type a number range in a cell in an excel 2002 spread
sheet, ex. '10-20' (without the quotes).

When we leave the cell, it defaults to date format, '20-Oct'.

When we change the format of the cell to number or general, it fills in
with '40471'.

What can we do to get the cell to display literally what we type in it?

Thanks.

 

[Don Guillett]

Pre format as text

 

[Joe User]

We are trying to type a number range in a cell in an
excel 2002 spread sheet, ex. '10-20' (without the quotes).

Try entering the text with a leading apostrophe, i.e. literally '10-20 .

I do not have Excel 2002.

But in Excel 2003, the leading apostrophe is metasyntax that tells Excel not
to interpret the remaining text. The apostrophe is not part of the text.
The apostrophe does not appear when Excel displays the cell value. And you
would write IF(A1="10-20",TRUE), not IF(A1="'10-20",TRUE).

Since your are entering text, you might also want to adjust the Alignment
format for the cells.

Alteratively, format the cell or column as Text before entering any values.


----- original message -----

 

[capitan]

Try entering the text with a leading apostrophe, i.e. literally '10-20 .

I do not have Excel 2002.

But in Excel 2003, the leading apostrophe is metasyntax that tells Excel
not to interpret the remaining text. The apostrophe is not part of the
text. The apostrophe does not appear when Excel displays the cell value.
And you would write IF(A1="10-20",TRUE), not IF(A1="'10-20",TRUE).

Since your are entering text, you might also want to adjust the
Alignment format for the cells.

Alteratively, format the cell or column as Text before entering any values.

This worked. Thank you!