date problem

[D Blount]

I want to be able to type 110503 and have it show up as
11/05/03 so I selected that date format.

Problem is when I type 110503 I get 7/19/06. Is there
any way to do this?

 

[Sandy Mann]

Excel counts the number of days from its base date - in your case I assume
that you are using the 1904 date system - and formats it to look like a
date. Try entering today's date and then re-formatting it as General - you
should see 36756. Excel therefore takes your entry of 110503 as day 110503
from the start date of 1/1/1904 which is 19 July 2206 in your selected
format it shows up as 1/19/06

HTH

Sandy

 

[JE McGimpsey]

The format of the cell (other than when set to Text) has no bearing on
how the parser interprets your input.

For a way to accomplish your objective using an event macro, see

http://cpearson.com/excel/DateTimeEntry.htm