convert date to name of month

[holly]

My spreadsheet:

A B
Results: C
1/5/09 =IF(A1="","",MONTH(A1)) 1
?


In Column C, I need to write a formula that says =IF($B1=1,"January"...)
but my statement if FALSE, needs to be, IF($B1=2,"February" and so forth all
the way through the calendar. The false will be if a new IF formula.

I started with this,
=IF($B1=1,"January",IF($B1=2,"February",IF($B1=3,"March")))

And all the way down the line to December, with the correct # of close
parens (12 of them) but I get an error. Do I need to keep typing in the "IF"
for a false statement? Help please

 

[Dave Peterson]

=if(a1="","",text(date(2009,a1,1),"mmmm"))

Is one way.

 

[holly]

By the way, I tried the =TEXT($B1,"mmmm") in cell C1 and it returned January
when it should have returned February because I had the date of 2/9 in cell
A1, and a 2 in cell B1.

 

[Brad]

If you simply have a 2 in cell b1 you will get January because Excel thinks
that the date is (January 2, 1900). To have the "mmmm" work you need to
have a valid date or make sure that your number is between 32 and 59
inclusive.

 

[holly]

THANK YOU!

=if(a1="","",text(date(2009,a1,1),"mmmm"))

Is one way.

 

[Dave Peterson]

Excel sees dates as numbers starting with a base date (January 1, 1900) as a
plain old number (1/1/1900 = 1) that is nicely formatted.

So when you look at 1, 2, 3, ...
it's like looking at:
1/1/1900, 1/2/1900, 1/3/1900, ...

And all of those belong to January of 1900.

So =text(a1,"mmmm") will return January for all these.

 

[Dave Peterson]

But you could get creative and use something like:

=if(a1="","",text(a1*28,"mmmm"))

All those values (1*28, 2*28, ..., 12*28) will refer to dates in 1900, but since
you're just looking at the month, it doesn't matter.