I'm trying to use fixed format information in a file (used to be printed) to
Excel 2003. One goal is to try to make the spreadsheet look as close to the
data file as possible. I'm also trying to disturb the user's environment as
little as possible and drive Excel from the program. I'm currently filling
in the proper cells with the right data but have some limitations that I'd
like to overcome.

Can I tell Excel to use a fixed-sized font?

Can I tell Excel to use a red background for selected cells without knowing
the cell number?

A column may not always have numbers (perhaps column headers, etc.) Can I
indicate that if a cell in column 10, 11, or 13 is numeric, it should be
formatted to always have two decimal places? It should still remain a number
and not be converted to text, kind of like using
Format-Cell-Number-Currency.

Sometimes a number (250.00 and -332.11, both with following spaces) will not
be converted to a number. The cell has an error message of "The number in
this cell is formatted as text or preceeded by an apostrophe." What do I
need to do to get rid of the error?

I tried preceeding all numbers in the column with an "=" so the numbers
ended up being "= 250.00" [space follows the equal] or "=-322.11" [minus sign
replaced the space"]. That caused a different error on other cells: "The
formula in this cell differs from the formulas in this area of the
spreadsheet." Interestingly enough, the same column has one value of 6.02
with the 2nd error message and one value of 6.02 without.

The solution to this whole formatting mess may be to format all numbers as
text and let the user format them to be numeric if that's needed.

I know this is a bunch of questions. Thanks for your time.
Scott