Hi Jim,
Actually I found what caused it ..

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/943985

this patch V1 and V2 have changed how text based .xls files are opened, it
seems to automatically run the text to columns wizard using the fixed width
option which works on the first few lines of text to work out columns .. this
isnt any good as usually our "text" files are reports from another system
with headings etc that in no way line up with the columns of data .. (we get
two columns in one , numbers cut in half ) .

If I remove the two patches above .. V1 and V2 they open as I would expect
with all data in the first column allowing the user to manually choose
columns/ delims .

I am unable to hold shift down as excel is being run/opened programatically
from another program .

Carl






"Jim Cone" wrote:


Maybe one of Dave Peterson's comments in this post will be of help...
http://tinyurl.com/2q5rr8
--
Jim Cone
San Francisco, USA
http://www.realezsites.com/bus/primitivesoftware
(Excel Add-ins / Excel Programming)




wrote in message
On Mar 27, 1:52 pm, wrote:
Before SP3 we renamed a text file to filename.xls and then executed
it (done by an automatic process) which made excel open it up with
all contents in the first column. It was then up to the user to do a
text to columns either by fixed size or delimited as they wanted.

After SP3 Excel auto-delimits the file , and I cannot see a way to
stop it from doing this as 99% of the time its delimiting is wrong.

Can anyone help or am I stuffed. ps excel 2003 ..

OOPS .. sorry its not SP3 related .. its related to the latest office
security patches ...