Apache OpenOffice Community Forum

This seems obvious, but I cannot find the answer anywhere. Is there an easy way to globally change the contents of cells that are forced to text by an apostrophe ( 'string ) to numbers without the apostrophe that can be sorted ( string )?

Thanks!

-- Donald

DonaldFR wrote:This seems obvious, but I cannot find the answer anywhere. Is there an easy way to globally change the contents of cells that are forced to text by an apostrophe ( 'string ) to numbers without the apostrophe that can be sorted ( string )?

Thanks!

-- Donald

The easiest way is to use the VALUE() function to create a new column of numbers.

Thanks, but that doesn't help in my situation (I don't think!).

I've got a colum of British format dates ('DD/MM/YYYY) that I need to change to DD/MM/YYYY in a form that Calc would recognize as a date.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

-- Donald

1) Select the cells you want to convert
2) Make sure the cells have any number format other than "Text" ("@").
3) Data > Text to Columns
3a) Separated by: Tab (any character not present in the column datsa is OK)
3b) Select the column in the preview and change the column type to Date: D/M/Y
4) Click OK

Hi Donald

=DATEVALUE(A1) and then you must format the cell to a dateformat.

wolfgang

Another possible route is here:

To get rid of ' before a number .... (seen when some Excel files are opened in Open Office):
Alt,E,F and in search type ".+" and replace with "&" and tick regular expressions.

I tried most of these options, and the one by acknak worked. Thank you all!

-- Donald