If I read your post correctly, each date column is formatted uniformly
within itself; that is, one column is formatted as actual dates and the
other as the 5-digit number. Assume Column A is formatted as a date and
Column B as the 5-digit number. Put this formula in row 2 (assuming that is
the row your data starts in)...

=IF(A2=DATE(2000+LEFT(B2),MID(B2,2,2),RIGHT(B2,2)) ,TRUE,FALSE)

Rick


"botany_girl" wrote in message
...
Hello!

I have a worksheet containing two datasets. Each set of data has
associated
dates--but they are entered as different numbers. One set has the date in
format ymmdd as a number, i.e. 10501 represents May 1, 2001 (the year is
one
digit in the source data). The other set has the date entered as a date,
i.e. 5/1/2001. I have the columns set up so that they display the same
numbers, but the original data within the columns is formatted
differently.

I have to look at the data to make sure that the values in the two columns
match. However, it's a huge dataset, so doing this manually is going to
take
a long time. I wanted to insert a logical argument
[=IF(value1=value2,true,false] in a separate column to save time, but
since
the source data are in different formats, I get a FALSE every time.

Any ideas on how I convert these beasts into identical formats so that I
can
use the logical argument strategy? The displayed numbers must not be
changed
to the odd Excel date-counting format, unfortunately--if that were the
case
it wouldn't be so difficult.

Thanks for any suggestions,

lisa