Windows to Mac date conversion.

[untrodbaths]

Greetings.

I recently upgraded to a Mac (I never thought I'd say that), and I'm
having a problem with Mac Office 2008. I have a lot of spreadsheets
that I created in Windows Excel 2003, and when I open them with the
Mac the date formats don't work at all. In fact, it seems that date
formats don't even work on a new spreadsheet after I've opened one of
the XP spreadsheets.

Is there a way to convert my old spreadsheets so that date formats
work on the Mac?

Thanks!

 

[CyberTaz]

You'll have to give us a better hint - "don't work at all" doesn't really
describe the problem very well. Since we can't see your screen out here
you'll need to give us a clearer picture of the problem.

Also, specify your exact update level of both Office as well as OS X.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[untrodbaths]

You'll have to give us a better hint - "don't work at all" doesn't really
describe the problem very well. Since we can't see your screen out here
you'll need to give us a clearer picture of the problem.

Also, specify your exact update level of both Office as well as OS X.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

Office = 12.1.5
OS X = 10.5.6

The format of the date column in my XP spreadsheet is dd-mmm-yy (28-
Feb-09). When I open the spreadsheet in Mac Excel, the dates appear
correctly. However, if I enter a new date, such as "2/28/9", it
appears as "2/28/9". If I select that cell and "Format cells..." and
change the format to dd-mmm-yy, nothing happens.

Thank you!

 

[Phillip Jones, C.E.T.]

Your fomatting wrong. should be typed in as 02/28/2009

 

[CyberTaz]

It sounds like you're expecting Excel to transpose your entry for you & that
isn't going to happen Excel takes its cue from the Date Format specified
in the International Preferences of the OS. If that's set for m/d/y it's
expected that the user will enter the data in that order and 5/6/9 will be
recognized as May 6th and 2/28/9 will be interpreted as Feb 28th. However,
if 6/5/9 is entered it will be interpreted as June 5th but 28/2/9 doesn't
fit a date profile so it will be interpreted as a text entry... And just
changing the format won't have any effect because the entry is already
defined as a text string. IOW, formatting only applies to an entry for which
it is valid. As an exaggerated example typing June Fifth will not be
converted to a date no matter what formatting is applied to the cell.

Bottom line : If you want the date to be understood as a date, formatted as
desired it has to be entered in that order. In this case it has to be
entered as 28/2/9 [rather than 2/28/9] so the m-d-y formatting will work.
Entering it as 2/28/9 is not being recognized as something the format
applies to because there is no 28th month.

HTH |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[untrodbaths]

It sounds like you're expecting Excel to transpose your entry for you & that
isn't going to happen Excel takes its cue from the Date Format specified
in the International Preferences of the OS. If that's set for m/d/y it's
expected that the user will enter the data in that order and 5/6/9 will be
recognized as May 6th and 2/28/9 will be interpreted as Feb 28th. However,
if 6/5/9 is entered it will be interpreted as June 5th but 28/2/9 doesn't
fit a date profile so it will be interpreted as a text entry... And just
changing the format won't have any effect because the entry is already
defined as a text string. IOW, formatting only applies to an entry for which
it is valid. As an exaggerated example typing June Fifth will not be
converted to a date no matter what formatting is applied to the cell.

Bottom line : If you want the date to be understood as a date, formatted as
desired it has to be entered in that order. In this case it has to be
entered as 28/2/9 [rather than 2/28/9] so the m-d-y formatting will work.
Entering it as 2/28/9 is not being recognized as something the format
applies to because there is no 28th month.

HTH |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

Office = 12.1.5
OS X = 10.5.6

The format of the date column in my XP spreadsheet is dd-mmm-yy (28-
Feb-09). When I open the spreadsheet in Mac Excel, the dates appear
correctly. However, if I enter a new date, such as "2/28/9", it
appears as "2/28/9". If I select that cell and "Format cells..." and
change the format to dd-mmm-yy, nothing happens.

Thank you!

Yes, of course. Thank you very much for the clear explanation!