Re: [libreoffice-users] CALC convert text to numbers

I'm with Charles on this one. I was the OP on the problem. 

Nearly all of my issues are because I have my LO spreadsheet and then a CSV file. If I open the CSV 
file in LO it looks fine. I can't just import it into my existing spreadsheet because the data in 
it need to go into small subsets of my big spreadsheet. So I typically copy and paste groups of 
cells as required.

What I am used to doing in Excel is copy everything in, then format the cells to be numbers and 
they are converted to numbers and my formula work.

Or if I know they are text (but there is ABSOLUTELY NO WAY TO SEE THAT IN LO) I can do a paste 
special and that also works in excel and prevents the additional step of formatting the cells back 
to numbers.

All the discussions about the leading apostrophe are great but I still can't see it in LO nor can I 
remove it.

Yes, I got around the problem this time by creating a dummy column as described many messages ago, 
but the fact remains that it is neither easy to change nor easy to see when numbers are formatted 
as text in LO and coming from MsOffice this causes lots of problems. 

On Nov 17, 2013, at 12:49 PM, Charles Smith <chuc@chucsmith.org> wrote:

> Hello,
>
> I can only speak for myself, but numbers get formatted as text in two ways:
>
> 1. Import of a tab delimited or csv file. 
>
> 2. Spreadsheets sent to me from other users who have imported such files. 
>
> Usually I format the import to avoid the problem, but if I just double click a csv file, it opens 
> with the numbers formatted as text. Visually this is not a problem. But if I then decide I need 
> to edit the sheet I either have to reimport it or reformat the numbers. 
>
> Hope this explains how it happens to me. 
>
> Charles
>
> Sent from my iPod Touch
>
> On Nov 17, 2013, at 12:16 PM, James E Lang <jim+lou@lang.hm> wrote:
>
> > I've been following this debate with great interest. 
> >
> > One big question comes to mind: Why would someone use the apostrophe construct in the first 
> > place if he intended to perform arithmetic calculations using the cell content? I understand 
> > ending up with a text string rather than a number by forgetting to use VALUE() on a substring in 
> > a formula but even that seems to fall into the category of a "cockpit error" rather than an 
> > "aircraft design flaw" as is being implied on one side of this debate. 
> >
> >
> >
> > -- 
> > Jim
> >
> >
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Eugenie (Oogie) McGuire 
Desert Weyr http://www.desertweyr.com/  
Paonia, CO USA


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