Stop auto correction of number into a date

Anonymous
2010-04-09T11:08:55+00:00

When i work with excel, i do data entry, some of the numbers that i type in can be interpenetrated  as dates. when this happens excel automatically changes the format of the cell from general, to date. i want to be able to stop this auto correction.

I know there are a number of ways to avoid this happening, but i am fed up with these methods. i simply what to turn the auto correct off, so that instead of what i type into the cell changing, what i type into the cell shows exactly what i typed in.

really hope there is someone out the who knows how to do this.

thanks

Microsoft 365 and Office | Excel | For home | Windows

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Anonymous
2010-04-09T17:09:58+00:00

If you format the cells as Text, all entries will be entered as text

(leading zeroes will be retain, date-like values won't be converted to dates, etc)

...CTRL+1 (to view the formatting dialog window)

...Select: Number_tab...Category: Text

That should resolve most (but not all) of the problem.

Does that work for you?

Ron Coderre

Microsoft MVP - Excel (2006 - 2010)

P.S. If any post answers your question, please mark it as the Answer (so it won't keep showing as an open item.)

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Anonymous
2010-04-09T16:55:47+00:00

Tim

I understand your frustration but this is not an autocorrect issue. 

Typing in 1/5 will automatically be recognised as a date as that is what it is unless... you signify that it is a formula and you expect the answer 0.2 to appear or it is a text item in which case you must preceed the data with a ' apostrophy.

In signifying the that the item is text you will have a data item which is left aligned, as all text is by default.  All other items in this column (even if purely numeric such as product codes) should aligned left.  Product codes though numeric should never be treaded like numbers, if you do, then expect issues.  Telephone numbers are similarly not true numbers, if they were treated as such, leading zeros would be dropped.

Though the whole idea of having to type in that extra character of ' is a pain to remember, it will make your data more acurate, reliable and portable.

Pat PS If you found this useful please vote. Thank you:¬)

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  1. Anonymous
    2014-10-04T11:50:30+00:00

    Yes, I think we agreed that back in 2010.

    This thread is 'de facto' for helping users avoid or work-around the patronising behaviour of Excel.

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  2. Anonymous
    2014-10-03T23:44:05+00:00

    Thank you to those of you who try to reply with solutions.  The issue, however, is that we should not have to bend over backwards just to get out what we put in.  The issue is that Excel is changing our data without our desire (or permission) to do so - and that needs to stop.  

    I am hoping the following analogy will illustrate the problem that I have with Excel.

    I imagine most people fill their car up with gas several times a month.  I also imagine that the majority of people who put gas in their cars use regular unleaded.  Imagine that you were one of those people who liked super unleaded.  You pull up to the gas tank and hit the "super unleaded" button - but the gas tank doesn't believe you want super unleaded.  Most people want regular unleaded - so it changes it back to regular.  The gas tank, like Excel, thinks it knows what you want better than you do.  Now, there's a work around that has been devised to allow you to get super unleaded - but you have to hold the super unleaded button down throughout the entire time that you are pumping gas, as soon as you let go of the button, it reverts to regular.  Just because there is a work around, doesn't mean that people have to be happy with the fact that they have to use it.

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  3. Anonymous
    2014-10-03T11:54:05+00:00

    Hi

    Consider the type of file you receive; if the (file) extenstion is text or csv, consider opening it with a text editor like Notepad, Worpad, Notepas++.

    If ever you open that kind of text file in Excel, you do a kind of file import. But with CSV file type, you do not have the change to get the file import wizard that allows you to define the datat type of each column.

    To avoid the skipping,of the wizard simpply re-associated the file type .CSV with NotePad.  or change the file extension to TXT.

    Never open a text file directly into a database program without an import check, that is : to define the data type of each column.

    To avoid any change, the column you want to preserve should be ot the "Text" data type during import.

    HTH

    Regards

    JY

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