You can use Data, Text to columns, delimited
separate first on left paren
next pass separate on space
use change all to change close paren to (nothing, leave empty) via Ctrl+H
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HTH,
David McRitchie, Microsoft MVP - Excel [site changed Nov. 2001]
My Excel Pages: http://www.mvps.org/dmcritchie/excel/excel.htm
Search Page: http://www.mvps.org/dmcritchie/excel/search.htm

"xppuser" wrote in message ...
Dear all,

I would appreciate help and advice for my problem. I want to import a data
set into excel using Data - Import External Data - Import Data. My data
(which is saved as text file) looks like this:

Belgium (1999) 22/31 5/232
Greenland (1996) 5/21 3/87

i.e. country 'space' 'open bracket' year 'close bracket' 'tab' number '/'
number tab number '/' number.

What I want to import to the spread sheet is just country in one column,
year (without the brackets) in the next column, followed by columns of number
number number number without the 'forward / slash' in between. I tried but
not getting anywhere with the above function. Would appreciate help and
advice. Thank you.

Kind regards,
jes