Post by Brig_viewWhy does excel
represent the number correctly and word does not until it's formatted?
"Why" is always a difficult question to answer, particularly when you are
not the author of the software concerned. But...
You have almost answered your own question:
a. Excel stores the nmber internally using a floating point
representation which is not necessarily exactly what you typed in
b. Excel either applies default cell formats or one you explicitly apply
yourself, correcting the problem
c. when Word connects to Excel to get the data using OLEDB (the default
mechanism in Word 2002/2003) it retrieves the stored number, not the
displayed number, and nor does it retrieve the display format information.
d. Word has no knowledge of how you want to display the number so outputs
its version of the internal representation.
In my view, ideally OLEDB, or whatever mechanism MS standardised on for
internal Office data communications, would let you retrieve either the
internal representation, or the displayed values, or both, but it doesn't.
And you could well ask "Why?" about that, too...
You can revert to the DDE connection method (check
Word|Tools|Options|General|"Confirm conversions at open", go through the
connection process again, and select DDE when offered), which will typically
retrieve the display version of the data, but it does have its own problems
and limitations.
I suspect that MS would have a chance to do this stuff better if it put a
bit more effort into ensuring that intra-Office data communications could
all be XML-based and used a very standard set of data types and information
about representation.
Just my 2c worth...
Peter Jamieson
Post by Brig_viewThanks the solution was posted on this site. You have to format the field in
word by toggling between the fields and adding \#00.00. Why does excel
represent the number correctly and word does not until it's formatted?
Post by Brig_viewI have an excel file used in a mail merge, the file has been formatted as
numbers to 2 decimal places eg. 10.01, 10.03. When I use this file in the
mail merge I get 10.03 represented as 10.0299999. How do I make word
represent the numbers I have in the excel file?