Importing downloads into Excel
 

We typically take a mainframe download (a txt file) and import it into Excel
for the purpose of doing some data comparisons (using Exact for example) and
doing some calculations with If functions.
Lately, I noticed that on some of the numerical fields, the last digit of
numeric data is sometimes changed to a letter (a, c, h, etc.). Not always.
I cant seem to discern a pattern to this, YET.
Is there someway to get Excel to correctly interpret this for me?

Thanks
Marsh

Importing downloads into Excel
 

I'd open that .txt file in notepad and verify that the data is coming from the
Mainframe correctly.

Maybe it's not excel.

Marsh wrote:

We typically take a mainframe download (a txt file) and import it into Excel
for the purpose of doing some data comparisons (using Exact for example) and
doing some calculations with If functions.
Lately, I noticed that on some of the numerical fields, the last digit of
numeric data is sometimes changed to a letter (a, c, h, etc.). Not always.
I cant seem to discern a pattern to this, YET.
Is there someway to get Excel to correctly interpret this for me?

Thanks
Marsh

--

Dave Peterson

Importing downloads into Excel
 

Thank you very much for your help.
The download is correct, but you made me think and inquire more than I had.
I got a table of the numbers that the letters represent (I created a lookup
table), parse them with the right function, and replace the number returned
with VLOOKUP using Substitute.
Most complex formula I have done, with no help, but you got me thinking.
Thanks Dave!!!

"Dave Peterson" wrote:

I'd open that .txt file in notepad and verify that the data is coming from the
Mainframe correctly.

Maybe it's not excel.

Marsh wrote:

We typically take a mainframe download (a txt file) and import it into Excel
for the purpose of doing some data comparisons (using Exact for example) and
doing some calculations with If functions.
Lately, I noticed that on some of the numerical fields, the last digit of
numeric data is sometimes changed to a letter (a, c, h, etc.). Not always.
I cant seem to discern a pattern to this, YET.
Is there someway to get Excel to correctly interpret this for me?

Thanks
Marsh

--

Dave Peterson