1. I have posted a date to a field as January 05, 2008 and formatted it to be 01/05/2008 (mm/dd/yyyy) and result was good. but when i select the field the formula bar shows 1/5/2008 instead of 01/05/2008 removing the preceding 0's

Problem is when i take this excel sheet to compare with another sheet with field where i have directly entered date as 01/05/2008.

Result is : 1/5/2008 and 01/05/2008 and it says both fields are different.

Is there anyway i can solve this prob. as i told you before the formula bar displayed the 1st date from the beginning rather that 01/05/2008

2. The same thing happens when i posted Januray 05, 2008 and formatted it as Jan-08(Mmm-yy) result OK. but formula bar still showed the same 1/5/2008
and the same happens again when compared with the one originally entered as Jan-08



ALL I WANT IS THE FORMAT TO BE THE WAY I FORMAT IT (CONSTANT) FOREVER