Using text values in Pivot Tables

[Eric]

I am creating a simple pivot table with one field of values, numbers to be
summed, and a second field, occasional two letter alpha codes which are purely
descriptive and refer to the number in the same column, "row".
In the source spreadsheet, I have formatted the column which contains these
codes as "Text". Text is supposed to remain unchanged; however when that
column of data is entered into the pivot table as a value, it is handled as
though it were numeric data, and these two letter codes do not appear.
Because the software apparently recognizes the values as non-numeric it
assigns a "Count" descriptor by default, but this only converts each instance
of a the text values to "1", thus losing their original identity.
All the possible definers of the field are numeric operators like "Count" and
"Sum", which do not apply to an alpha code, which is just supposed to be
represented literally. Further I see no way to manipulate this data field to
be recognized as text in the pivot table itself.
How do I get the pivot table to just take this alpha data as is?
Thanks,
Eric

 

[Jim Thomlinson]

The text field only makes sense in either the row or column headers. If you
place it in the data section then it will return the most logical aggregation
which is a count as sum does not make sense with text.

In the data section of the pivot table what exactly were you wanting it to do?

 

[Eric]

Thanks for your response Jim.
I don't want the text codes to do anything. They are just descriptors of
some of the numbers in the same column, row, when those numbers have met
various external criteria. It is important information that I need to be
able to see as is with no conversion. They would not function properly as
column or row labels, they are data that need to appear next to the
particular numbers they qualify. I have the sinking feeling that for some
reason pivot tables can only deal with Values numerically. Even though it
would be straightforward to just place them where they belong unmolested.
Eric

 

[Jim Thomlinson]

Your only choice is row and column headers. Pivot tables aggregate data in a
cube. The data secton shows the aggregation of those fields. It can not show
text associated with those aggregations. The reason being is that the
aggregation may contain values with more than one descriptor at which point
what should it show.

A simple example...
Region / Location / Sales

If I place the region in the left column and sales in the data section then
the aggregation of the region will have multiple locations assocatied each
data value. Now if I add location to the data section what should it show???

 

[Eric]

Thanks very much Jim for your explanation. It's not what I wanted to hear,
but it's what I needed to know.
Eric

 

[Richard A]

It should show the max() or min() values, evaluated alpha-numerically, which
are options for Excel pivots and which work in SQL (even Access) despite
being aggregate functions there, too. Is Microsoft working on an add-in for
Excel that will allow this?