[dsmith402]

so no matter i try when i paste numbers from outside of office into excel strange things seem to happen. for example if i manually or paste in the numbers 1889532733902743187 the cell will read 1.88953E+18 as soon as i click off the cell. then once i click back on that original cell i entered the original information the last 4 numbers default to all zeros. can anyone explain why this is happening and how i can prevent this from happening

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Hi dsmith402,

Excel sees that long string of digits and converts to scientific notation, and as you noticed, it's not very helpful.

Do you have lots of these numbers to copy over? What's your data source?

One option is to set the cells you plan to copy the number into as "text" and then depending on the source, copy the number and right click and paste as "text."

Another option, depending on your data source is to split the number in half (into two different cells), so Excel sees each piece as a number, then concatenate the two cells, then format the results as text.

Best regards,

dm

[dm27]

Hi dsmith402,

Excel sees that long string of digits and converts to scientific notation, and as you noticed, it's not very helpful.

Do you have lots of these numbers to copy over? What's your data source?

One option is to set the cells you plan to copy the number into as "text" and then depending on the source, copy the number and right click and paste as "text."

Another option, depending on your data source is to split the number in half (into two different cells), so Excel sees each piece as a number, then concatenate the two cells, then format the results as text.

Best regards,

dm

[dsmith402]

all the numbers i work with will be that long (since its for my job) but i'll give it a try by formatting all the cells to text and see if that'll stop this little problem.

also, all the numbers are coming from an in-house program we use

time for trial n error, thanks dm for the suggestion

[dm27]

Hi,

Sorry I don't have more to offer at the moment...

What file format does your system output the data?

Those numbers look just like the pre-paid gift card numbers I work with...

Best of luck to you and thanks for visiting GeeksToGo.

Sincerely,

dm

[dm27]

Hi dsmith402,

I forgot to mention that depending on how you are getting the data, you may want to try using the Import External Data wizard (if the source is a CSV file or similar). This would allow you to format the column with the numbers as "text" at the time of import.


dm