excel skips to another workbook for no apparent reason

I am also able to reproduce the problem now following similar steps. Resize a column then select a new cell, at which point excel becomes "locked" until I press enter and then it shifts focus to another excel window. It only happens if another excel window is minimized. If all excel windows are opened but visible or not the problem does not seem to happen.

Very frustrating that it seems to be a known and reproducible problem that has not been fixed for a long time...

I have been able to reproduce this issue several times in a row by performing the following actions with more than one spreadsheet open:

1. Resize a column that has data present
2. Enter data into the column that was just resized and press "Enter"
3. I am now in "bug mode" wherein I can't enter text until I press "Enter" again, at which point one of the other open spreadsheets pops up over the one I'm working on.  

I was able to reproduce this bug at will until I closed the specific sheet that was popping up when I pressed "Enter."   Once that sheet was closed, I was not able reproduce the issue, even with other sheets open.   There is no linkage between the sheet I'm actually working on and the one that popped up when pressing "Enter" and I can't figure out how the buggy relationship starts, but this issue occurs (for me) maybe a dozen times per day.

I imported a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet into another package. I've had a problem with these skipping cells for years! So I finally figured there must be something embedded in the cell that was causing the problem. So I highlighted and deleted everything from it, contents, formats the lot. I then reentered the text.The problem has gone!!!!!

Hope this helps out some other frustrated person!

Agreed, this is beyond frustrating and quite absurd this thread was created 3 years ago and the same issue persists. I expected a quick google search would help but clearly this issue isn't going anywhere. I've taken to just closing out all workbooks I'm not currently using. Hopefully we can find a resolution.

...

I will also try opening the spreadsheets differently, but it is cumbersome and I know I won't always remember--

I'm glad I read this, as I was just about to buy a new keyboard, thinking there was a shortcut or hotkey programmed that I didn't know about, or set on accident....

Regarding opening spreadsheets differently, please note my comments above about the registry change -- which has completely eliminated this problem for us. You don't need to remember anything.

It is exasperating. I would not expect any changes to occur from the development end, however. This kind of problem has become a very low priority for all software vendors. Most vendors no longer even use professional testers before releases.