Re: [libreoffice-users] need some help with custom number format code

At 15:06 19/03/2018 +0100, Oszkó Albert wrote:
> I would like to create a custom number format 
> code in Calc, to spare some work. This would be 
> like this AB-01/2018. I would like to increment 
> only the 01 part by dragging that little 
> rectangle on the lower right of the cell. So I 
> created as custom formats "AB-"##"/2018" or 
> "AB-"\/YYYY. Unfortunately in either case only 
> the year number is incremented and not what I wanted.

I'm not sure that's true - but it depends anyway 
on the actual values you propose to enter into 
the cells. Are you suggesting entering the number 
1 and filling down to produce 2, 3, and so on - 
or to enter the date 1 January 2018 (in whatever 
format) and filling that down to 1 February 2018 
and so on? In addition, is the 2018 part fixed, 
or do you want that eventually to change? Do you 
want 12/2018 to be followed by 13/2018, that is, or by 01/2019?

Your first form works if the cells contain just 
the numbers 1, 2, and so on - not dates - though 
it would have to use "00" in place of "##" if 
January were to appear as "01" and not as "1" and 
so on. And it runs out if you want 2019 to appear when appropriate.

> How to proceed?

You could easily assemble this using a formula by 
concatenating the text with a formatted version 
of the relevant date. For example, put 1 January 
2018 (as a date) in A1. If you fill down from 
this, you will get 2 January and so on, which is 
not what you want. Instead enter 1 February 2018 
in A2. Now select A1 and A2 together and drag the 
fill handle: that will give you 1 March, 1 April, and so on. Now in B1 enter
="AB-"&TEXT(A1;"MM/YYYY")
and fill that down the column. You can hide the 
unwanted column A or put it away on another sheet if you prefer.

You could avoid the extra column by generating the date in the formula:
="AB-"&TEXT(DATE(2018;ROW();1);"MM/YYYY")
Fill that down to achieve the desired effect. If 
your values start in a row other than the first, 
you will need to change "ROW()" to "ROW()-x", 
where "x" is some appropriate value. Note that 
this formula relies on the ability of the DATE() 
function to interpret the thirteenth month of 2018 as January 2019 and so on.

But yes: you can achieve this by formatting 
dates. Just use the format "AB-"MM/YYYY. Once 
again, you will need to enter your first two 
dates (1 January and 1 February 2018) into the 
first two cells, select both, and then drag the 
fill handle so as to create dates one month 
apart, not one day apart, as would happen if you 
try to fill from a single prototype.

I trust this helps.

Brian Barker  


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