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while importing text file, loosing zeros

Posted by S. Egilmez on December 12, 2001 7:18 AM

I have a text file that I get from an ORACLE output (I can choose delimiter either as comma, tab or pipes(|)). In this delimited file, I have numerous numbers and dates that starts with "0". everytime when I import it to excel, I loose these leading zeros. I am using Excel 2000 and follow the wizard(is there a custom manual way to import?). Please advise how to overcome this frustrating challenge. Also in the wizard, there is no option to identify the columns as number columns. Is there a way to do this?
Thanks

Posted by Damon Ostrander on December 12, 2001 12:50 PM

Hi S.

The easiest solution is to simply import the columns that contain leading zeros in Text format rather than General (the default) in the last step of the import process. Just be aware that these will then be text values, not dates or numbers.

Damon