what can I say?

there's plenty of 16bit legacy in Excel.
and plenty of trouble with strings 255

content is truncated when sheets are copied.
many functions wont work on "long" strings.
editing formulas/names
etc
etc
etc

silly?.. i'd use a stronger word myself.


--
keepITcool
| www.XLsupport.com | keepITcool chello nl | amsterdam


NickHK wrote :

keepITcool,
I can work around, but it seems pretty silly that the only format
specifically for text cannot handle more than 255 characters, whilst
all the others display correctly.

Correction to above:
Looking at the Format cellsNumber dialog, the "Sample" frame at the
top display correctly for all formats except General, Accounting &
Text which show "#####.." instead of the correct text. Of these 3,
Accounting & Text cause the cell to display "####..."

NickHK

"keepITcool" wrote in message
ft.com...

Nick,

It's not merged cells that's causing the problem,
Appears to be the use of @ in the (custom) numberformat when
applied to text 255 char.

Also i cant see that you have a problem:
I've never heard of a valid barcode that was longer than 255 chars..
.. so just insert multiple barcodes in multiple cells.

or start the string with an apostrophe or vblf/linefeed

--
keepITcool
www.XLsupport.com | keepITcool chello nl | amsterdam


NickHK wrote :

I have one cell on a template that displays all "#########....."
when I insert more than 255 characters, although all text is
present and can be edited.
Merged cells are formatted as Text, Wrap=true, merged over 10
columns and 2 rows.
No validation or conditional formatting applied. No code running
upon change.

Reading:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/as...992911033.aspx

shows no reason for this behaviour.
If the merged cells are formatted as General, then text is
displayed as usual.
As barcodes may be inserted in this area, I need it formatted as
Text.

NickHK