I'm a fairly new user to Excel 2003. I have data in Columns A-D, with Column
A as the "main" column to be sorted alphabetically. But when I sort, I need
the finished table to contain the rest of the data from Columns B-D. We have
also skipped rows to leave the finished product easier to read.
Each time I have attempted to sort though, the data in Column A does sort
alphabetically, but only in a row-by-row fashion with no spaces, AND leaving
all the data from the rest of the columns in their initial locations, thus
not matching to its keyword in Column A.
Thanks

Highlight all columns A-D and then click sort. You can then sort by column A
and the rest of the columns will sort accordingly. Unfortunately blank rows
will not be kept in the sorted data.

"sgreene1" wrote:

I'm a fairly new user to Excel 2003. I have data in Columns A-D, with Column
A as the "main" column to be sorted alphabetically. But when I sort, I need
the finished table to contain the rest of the data from Columns B-D. We have
also skipped rows to leave the finished product easier to read.
Each time I have attempted to sort though, the data in Column A does sort
alphabetically, but only in a row-by-row fashion with no spaces, AND leaving
all the data from the rest of the columns in their initial locations, thus
not matching to its keyword in Column A.
Thanks

Make sure you select the range to sort (A1:D9999???) before you use data|sort.
If you aren't explicit with the range to sort, then excel will guess. And if
you have empty rows/columns, you're probably not going to like the way excel
guesses.

But when you sort your range, those empty cells will sort just like any other
data.

I always think it's a bad idea to insert empty rows for readability's sake.

Instead, I'd change the rowheight of the last row in a "group". I'd use a macro
so that I could reapply that formatting whenever I needed it.



sgreene1 wrote:

I'm a fairly new user to Excel 2003. I have data in Columns A-D, with Column
A as the "main" column to be sorted alphabetically. But when I sort, I need
the finished table to contain the rest of the data from Columns B-D. We have
also skipped rows to leave the finished product easier to read.
Each time I have attempted to sort though, the data in Column A does sort
alphabetically, but only in a row-by-row fashion with no spaces, AND leaving
all the data from the rest of the columns in their initial locations, thus
not matching to its keyword in Column A.
Thanks

--

Dave Peterson