What does the @ symbol do?

[rod]

If you type an @ symbol at the beginning of a cell it behaves in a similar
way to typing =. Indeed, it gets changed to = once you hit enter. Is it just
a synonym for = or does it do something else? Why is it not documented? I'm
getting errors loading data into excel programatically and I suspect its
because of a leading @ sign.

 

[Joel]

Check in the Tools Menu - Auto Correct.
You may have it setup to replace the @ with an =

The @ doesn't behave the same as an equal on my PC.

 

[Dave Peterson]

Lotus 123 uses @ as the function indicator: @sum(), @if().

Because excel wants to make it easy for Lotus 123 users to switch to excel, they
let you use @ when you enter the formula.

 

[Steve S]

The @ is a carry over from the old Lotus 123 days. The @ was the key to
start a formula. For example in Lotus 123 you would type @sum ( ) and in
excel you can type =sum ( ) or @sum( ) and get the same results.

 

[rod]

Thanks guys. I did finally find a help page in Excel about this "Differences
between Microsoft Excel and Lotus 1-2-3" but you needed to know it was a 123
issue. Not helped by the fact that you can't search for @ - well you can but
it doesn't find anything (even in this discussion group).

 

[Dave Peterson]

If your search for @ was successful, it probably wouldn't help. Every message
with an email address would be returned!

But glad you found the reason.

 

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