pound signs cell formatting

[Stephen]

I have a cell who's width is 2.43 and which contains a formula which
calculates any number of things, such as square feet, cubic feet, tons, ect.
based on which measurements are given. My formula is:

=IF(V12=0,S12,IF(Y12=0,S12*V12,IF(Y12>0,S12*V12*Y12))).

The problem I'm having is that even when it is formatted for general or
text, the cell displays pound signs instead of the number because the number
is too large to fit into one cell. I'm using Excel 2000. Like I said, I've
already tried formatting it for general, and for text, and neither worked.
Does anyone know how to get my spreadsheet to display numbers?

 

[Paul Lautman]

I have a cell who's width is 2.43 and which contains a formula which
calculates any number of things, such as square feet, cubic feet,
tons, ect. based on which measurements are given. My formula is:

=IF(V12=0,S12,IF(Y12=0,S12*V12,IF(Y12>0,S12*V12*Y12))).

The problem I'm having is that even when it is formatted for general
or text, the cell displays pound signs instead of the number because
the number is too large to fit into one cell. I'm using Excel 2000.
Like I said, I've already tried formatting it for general, and for
text, and neither worked. Does anyone know how to get my spreadsheet
to display numbers?

have you tried making the cell larger?

 

[Stephen]

I have a half-tone border around every cell so that it creates an even grid
in the body of the sheet. I can't make the cell larger because I need to
keep the grid uniform.

 

[Bernard Liengme]

Could you decrease the number of decimals displayed?

 

[RagDyeR]

Reduce the size of the font
Reduce the number of formatted decimals.
--

HTH,

RD
=====================================================
Please keep all correspondence within the Group, so all may benefit!
=====================================================

I have a half-tone border around every cell so that it creates an even grid
in the body of the sheet. I can't make the cell larger because I need to
keep the grid uniform.

 

[Stephen]

I don't have any decimals displayed...that shouldn't matter anyway. If I
have a number like 14,234.7, making it 14,234 isn't going to make it fit into
the cell any better, it will still be too big.

 

[Stephen]

I can't reduce the size of the font, I need it to be uniform throughout the
sheet. It is for a report for a client. There are no decimals. I have
formatted it for general and it didn't work. Even when I formatted it for
number, any number of decimals didn't make it work. When I formatted it for
text it didn't work.

 

[Paul Lautman]

I can't reduce the size of the font, I need it to be uniform
throughout the sheet. It is for a report for a client. There are no
decimals. I have formatted it for general and it didn't work. Even
when I formatted it for number, any number of decimals didn't make it
work. When I formatted it for text it didn't work.

Look, the # signs are displayed because the characters with their current
size will not fit into the cell with its current size. If you didn't have
the # signs then you would have only part of the number which would be
meaningless anyway. So you have 2 choices:

1) make the cell larger
2) make the font smaller

 

[Stephen]

Reducing the size only makes the pound signs smaller, it doesn't help fix the
problem. I have other cells formatted as text, but the cells contain
numbers. The numbers are large and don't fit into the cell, but it displays
the whole number anyway, it just overlaps into the next cell. I didn't have
to reduce the font size for that to work, and there are no decimal places in
the text formatting. My question is, is the formula contained in the cell
which displays the pound signs the reason the pound signs are being displayed
even though the cell is formatted exactly the same way as the ones with large
numbers in them that show up?

 

[Paul Lautman]

Reducing the size only makes the pound signs smaller, it doesn't help
fix the problem.

It does once you make is small enough!

I've just come up with an idea. Try:

=TEXT(IF(V12=0,S12,IF(Y12=0,S12*V12,IF(Y12>0,S12*V12*Y12))),"#")

Let me know if it works

 

[David Biddulph]

Look, the # signs are displayed because the characters with their current
size will not fit into the cell with its current size. If you didn't have
the # signs then you would have only part of the number which would be
meaningless anyway. So you have 2 choices:

1) make the cell larger
2) make the font smaller

Or try scientific notation?

 

[Stephen]

Paul, that's awesome, it worked. Now, though, if I get a number too large
for cells S12, V12, or Y12 I get pound signs in those where I didn't before.
What's up with that? Do you have any suggestions. If not, thanks alot for
what you've done so far.

 

[Paul Lautman]

Paul, that's awesome, it worked. Now, though, if I get a number too
large for cells S12, V12, or Y12 I get pound signs in those where I
didn't before. What's up with that? Do you have any suggestions.

Not without seeing the sheet. Any chance you can post a copy of it on the
web somewhere?

If