Excel 2003

[Tony Harvey]

Conditional formatting appears to fail if the referenced value has
parentheses in it.
I am comparing two cells with a "not equal to" condition, using a cell
reference without the dollar signs, and shading the cell light green.

With both cells filled with the same contents (including parenthetical text)
there is, of course no shading. If I delete the contents of the formatted
cell, no shading occurs even though the contents are different. If I restore
the formatted cell and delete the contents of the referenced cell the
conditional shading occurs.

Is this a known problem with a fix or work around?

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[Charles Williams]

I cannot duplicate your problem unless I delete the conditional formatting
in the cell (using for example Edit-->Clear All)

Are you sure the conditional formatting is still there unchanged?

Charles
__________________________________________________
The Excel Calculation Site
http://www.decisionmodels.com

 

[Tony Harvey]

Yes, the conditional formatting remains in place. However, I have found out
some more symptoms of my problem. The parenthetical nature of the cell text
was coincidental. Those cells were also larger than 255 characters. If I
reduce the text length of the referenced cell to 255, the conditional
formatting kicks in.

 

[Charles Williams]

OK, thanks, I can duplicate the problem: looks like a bug.

Tested in Excel 2007 and the problem has been fixed there.


Charles
__________________________________________________
The Excel Calculation Site
http://www.decisionmodels.com