Formatting cells in Excel does not work

P

Phil Nathan

Using Excel 2002 with the SP3 patches applied when I attempt to format
certain cells nothing happens. This applies wether I attemp this from the the
toolbar or directly withinh the cell. Any ideas?
 
N

Niek Otten

Maybe you try to format a cell as some type of number, but the cell is actually text, although it looks like a number. You can
easily check with the ISNUMBER() function.

--
Kind regards,

Niek Otten

| Using Excel 2002 with the SP3 patches applied when I attempt to format
| certain cells nothing happens. This applies wether I attemp this from the the
| toolbar or directly withinh the cell. Any ideas?
 
G

Gord Dibben

What have you got and what do you want that seems unachievable?

"Certain" cells means what?

Perhaps you are trying to format text that looks like a number but is not.

Or looks like a date but is not.

More detail please.


Gord Dibben MS Excel MVP

On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 13:21:03 -0700, Phil Nathan <Phil
 
P

Phil Nathan

Certain cells mean cells chosen at random that have numbers in them and not
formulas.
It is definitely a number because when I copy it to any other unoccupied
cell I can then select formatting and the Format Cells window pops up
indicating that indeed it is a number. However when I attempt to do the same
 
N

Niek Otten

I don't think you've followed my advice: "You can easily check with the ISNUMBER() function."

--
Kind regards,

Niek Otten


| Certain cells mean cells chosen at random that have numbers in them and not
| formulas.
| It is definitely a number because when I copy it to any other unoccupied
| cell I can then select formatting and the Format Cells window pops up
| indicating that indeed it is a number. However when I attempt to do the same
| on the original cell the window will not pop up.
| Even if it is text the Format Window should still pop up.
|
| "Gord Dibben" wrote:
|
| > What have you got and what do you want that seems unachievable?
| >
| > "Certain" cells means what?
| >
| > Perhaps you are trying to format text that looks like a number but is not.
| >
| > Or looks like a date but is not.
| >
| > More detail please.
| >
| >
| > Gord Dibben MS Excel MVP
| >
| > On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 13:21:03 -0700, Phil Nathan <Phil
| > [email protected]> wrote:
| >
| > >Using Excel 2002 with the SP3 patches applied when I attempt to format
| > >certain cells nothing happens. This applies wether I attemp this from the the
| > >toolbar or directly withinh the cell. Any ideas?
| >
| >
 
P

Phil Nathan

I solved my problem. The surrounding cells have vertical and horinzontal
borders aound it. When I remove the borders I can now format the cells
normally. Interestingly when I replace the borders I can also format the
cells. The cells were originally copied from another range where this problem
did not exist. It seems that the copy function corrupted the properties of
some cells. I can send you a stripped down copy and you can see for yourself.
 
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