Simple Conditional Format not working.

[Russk68]

Hi All
Ive been exploiting Excel for 20 plus years and I thought this would take me 10 seconds to do. I need conditional formatting to prevent me from entering a value in column E if the same row in column D is blank. I condensed this down to 1 cell so i colud trouble shoot. In E11 I put =ISBLANK(D11). When D11 is blank, I can put a value in E11. When D11 has a value Conditional Format triggers. This is the opposite of what I expected. I tested D11 with the ISBLANK formula in a cell. OK, Instead of racking my brain on why this should work, I figured that I would submit and invert to =NOT(ISBLANK(D11)) Now nothing happens if D11 is blank or not. I provided a video in the link. XL.mov
Thank you in advance!

 

[rollis13]

Are you using Conditional Format or Data Validation ? Anyway, I see that you didn't unselect the "Ignore Blank" option, it's decisive.

 

[Russk68]

Are you using Conditional Format or Data Validation ? Anyway, I see that you didn't unselect the "Ignore Blank" option, it's decisive.

Oh sorry. Data Validation. Thank you for pointing that out. I thought the skip blanks option was the ah ha moment. It's still doing the same thing. Am I correct by using =ISBLANK(D11) would prevent a value being entered in E11? That formula would return TRUE if D11 is blank, right?

 

[MARK858]

=ISBLANK(D11) would prevent a value being entered in E11?

It would prevent you entering a value in E11 if D11 isn't blank, remove the validation from E11 and delete E11 (delete not clear and remember you might have to make changes to other cells because of the move after the delete), then redo your data validation using

=NOT(ISBLANK($D$11))

and making sure the "Ignore Blank" is deselected

 

[Russk68]

It would prevent you entering a value in E11 if D11 isn't blank, remove the validation from E11 and delete E11 (delete not clear and remember you might have to make changes to other cells because of the move after the delete), then redo your data validation using

=NOT(ISBLANK($D$11))

and making sure the "Ignore Blank" is deselected

I tried every possible way to get this to work. Your instructions worked! Thank you very much for your time!!

 

[MARK858]

You're welcome

 

[Peter_SSs]

Your instructions worked! Thank you very much for your time!!

The marked solution has been changed accordingly. In your future questions, please mark the post as the solution that actually answered your question, instead of your feedback message as it will help future readers. No further action is required for this thread.