XP + Office XP

Yesterday, my wife while working on a spreadsheet apparently hit two keys simultaneously in error. The result was as follows:

1. when you highlight a cell, instead of the cell's outline appearing darker and solid, it appears darker and dotted (not ants and not moving).

2. in the lower right is an 'x'

3. when she called me yesterday in quasi panic she said that the sheet would not allow her to enter data in any cell.

She tried undo and the esc key to no avail. She could not close the sheet without saving given the amount of new work. I suggested selecting the entire sheet and copying to a new sheet. Oddly this maneuver not only allowed her to enter data in the new sheet but now allowed her to enter data in the original sheet. However, the cell condition as described in 1 & 2 remained in both the initial and new sheet.

What is going on with the cells and how do we get rid of it!?



Mark

Hi Markg2
You could try the following:
1. Clear the offending cell by right clicking on the cell and selecting clear contents.
or
2. Select the whole sheet with the exception of the offending cell, copy the data and move it to a new workbook completely.
Failing that, if it is not sensitive data could you post a copy and I can have a look at it for you or you could send it to my email and I will have a look (otpm@blueyonder.co.uk).
Hope that helps.
Tony

The entire sheet that has values entered displays the condition as described, not just a cell or two.

Hi Mark
In that case here is a little trick that MIGHT work. No garuantees but it is worth a try.
1. Open a MS Word document and change the view to Draft (i.e. not Page layout view. Then click on the show-hide button to show paragraph formatting in the blank document.
2. Open your spreadhseet and select the contents using Ctrl+A then Ctrl+C.
3. Alt+Tab to your MS Word document and enter Ctrl+V to paste the contents into the word document.
4. Enter Ctrl+A.
5. Then enter Ctrl+Shift+(Left Hand Arrow once). This has the effect of deselecting the last paragraph mark in the Word document (I will explain why at the end of these instructions).
6. Then enter Ctrl+C to copy the contents.
7. Alt+Tab back to Excel and open a new workbook then enter Ctrl+V to paste the contents back into Excel and se if that makes a difference.

To explain step 5 in a little more detail, what MS Word does is to store the formatting for the whole of the MS Word document in the last paragraph mark. By using the Ctrl+Shift+(left arrow once) before you copy (Ctrl+C) you potentially leave any bad formatting behind before you re-paste your data back into a new Workbook.
I have had this issue before with Word documents and it has worked.
Good luck and let me know how you get on.
Tony

Thanks for the effort but I gotta tell you...if that's what it would take my wife wouldn't get near the fix ;-)!

Mark

Hi Mark,

It sounds like your better half might have accidentally applied a dotted border to all cells. Simple enough to clear - Ctrl-A, then click on the Borders button on the Font panel and choose 'no border'.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Thanks Paul--the suggestion sort of works. All cells other than column A are returned to their normal appearance. However the Col A cells result in no grid/border at all. If I select column A and apply the multiple cell border option then the result is a dark border around all of Col A not the default light border of the rest and a new sheet.

Any suggestion?

Mark

That suggests the cells also have a fill colour. Ctrl-A, then click on the 'Fill Color' button and choose 'no fill'.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]