opening extensionless text files

[T Magritte]

Hi,

I often need to import text files from another application in comma or
tab delimited format. These are output from the other application as
an extensionless file. When I try to open these in Excel, I get the
error:

"The file you are trying to open, 'filename', is in a different format
than specified by the file extension. Verify that the file is not
corrupted and is from a trusted source before opening the file. Do you
want to open the file now?"

If I hit yes it loads fine. It's a minor annoyance, but is there any
way to get Excel to recognize by default that extensionless files are
text files and when appropriate, automatically detect if they are
column or tab separated formats? I can't recall offhand which it
likes, but for some txt files it will automatically separate the
columns, but for others it will import everything into 1 column then I
need to run the text to columns command as an extra step.

Thanks!

 

[Gary''s Student]

Instead if using:

File > Open

use:

Data > Import External Data > Import Data...

 

[T Magritte]

I'm using Excel 2007 and don't see that specific command. I can open a
file as a text file but then I need to select text file and put '*' in
the filename box before I can pick the file, and I still get the same
error message.

I can also start with a blank spreadsheet then use the Data/Get
External Data/From Text command which also won't give me the error.

I prefer to just double click on the filename from Windows Explorer,
though, then select excel.

Thanks.