Fill Series Grayed out and does not Work?
 

Sometimes the "Fill Series" functionality does not work as expected. On most
sheets I can type numbers 1, 2, 3 and select them and fill down with numbers
incrementing as high as I like, example 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, etc. Sometimes when I
try this it just repeats 1, 2, 3 over and over again.

There seems to be nothing unusual about the column. It is not sorted,
filtered, or formatted any special way. If I create a new sheet it will fill
down as expected. Also I find under the "Edit/Fill" menu the option for
"Series" is gray.

I dont think the problem relates to anything in the "Tools/Options section
because most sheets work as expected. The current sheet I am working on is a
copy and paste from another excel file.

I use Excel 2003 SP3

Any thoughts on why this sometimes happens and what I can do to fix it?

Quin

Fill Series Grayed out and does not Work?
 

When you do your fill, you should see a small pop-up box to the lower right
of your filled space. If you click on that, you should have the option fo
Copy or fill series, amongst others. You'd want Fill Series.

Not sure why your fill menu is greyed out. Are you editing a cell at the
time? (your cursor is blinking in the formula bar) That would cause it...

"Quin" wrote:

Sometimes the "Fill Series" functionality does not work as expected. On most
sheets I can type numbers 1, 2, 3 and select them and fill down with numbers
incrementing as high as I like, example 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, etc. Sometimes when I
try this it just repeats 1, 2, 3 over and over again.

There seems to be nothing unusual about the column. It is not sorted,
filtered, or formatted any special way. If I create a new sheet it will fill
down as expected. Also I find under the "Edit/Fill" menu the option for
"Series" is gray.

I dont think the problem relates to anything in the "Tools/Options section
because most sheets work as expected. The current sheet I am working on is a
copy and paste from another excel file.

I use Excel 2003 SP3

Any thoughts on why this sometimes happens and what I can do to fix it?

Quin

Fill Series Grayed out and does not Work?
 

Well, A picture is worth a thousand words and perhaps a file to look at will
be work 10,000.

Please take a look at an example of this...

http://members.cox.net/cquin2/CountTheEmployeesTest.xls

Try to fill down the numbers to count the employees. Perhaps someone will
understand what is going on when they can see the problem.

Quin


"Sean Timmons" wrote:

When you do your fill, you should see a small pop-up box to the lower right
of your filled space. If you click on that, you should have the option fo
Copy or fill series, amongst others. You'd want Fill Series.

Not sure why your fill menu is greyed out. Are you editing a cell at the
time? (your cursor is blinking in the formula bar) That would cause it...

"Quin" wrote:

Sometimes the "Fill Series" functionality does not work as expected. On most
sheets I can type numbers 1, 2, 3 and select them and fill down with numbers
incrementing as high as I like, example 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, etc. Sometimes when I
try this it just repeats 1, 2, 3 over and over again.

There seems to be nothing unusual about the column. It is not sorted,
filtered, or formatted any special way. If I create a new sheet it will fill
down as expected. Also I find under the "Edit/Fill" menu the option for
"Series" is gray.

I dont think the problem relates to anything in the "Tools/Options section
because most sheets work as expected. The current sheet I am working on is a
copy and paste from another excel file.

I use Excel 2003 SP3

Any thoughts on why this sometimes happens and what I can do to fix it?

Quin

Fill Series Grayed out and does not Work?
 

I just discovered my own answer...

I noticed that rows 6 and 7 were missing when I looked at the row headings.
That was a huge clue! First I tried "Unhide" but it didn't help. Then I
tried Data/Filter/show all. That did not help either. Last try was to apply
an auto filter and THEN "show all". That did the trick.

So...

It turns out I was wrong when I said I did not think the list was filtered.
It was not that obvious because show all command in the filter section did
not work in this case until I re-applied an auto filter.

No need for any further help. (But thanks anyway)

I will leave the test file up for a while in case anyone wants to take a look.

Quin