Excel copy resulting in image being pasted - excel

I've only just got Excel 2013 (I know I'm late to the party with this one) and I'm loving the new features. However, I'm finding an issue when copying from Excel and pasting into other programs.
If I attempt to copy cell data from Excel, it's pasting the value as an image and I don't understand why. So far, I've found this to be in pretty much everything that accepts HTML (e.g. a wysiwyg editor). What's more weird is that when I paste the copied cell data into Skype, it pastes both the text itself and an image of the text.
This doesn't happen when I paste into another Office program (Word, Outlook etc). Nor does it happen if I copy text from Word and into any other program.
It doesn't matter if the cell is formatted or not, if it's a brand new document, or if it's from an XLSX, XLS or CSV file.
When I'm copying cell data, I'm highlighting the cells I want and pressing CTRL + C on my keyboard. Then to paste, I'm using CTRL + V. I've tried combinations of using the shortcuts and file options to do both the copying and pasting but none have given me the correct results.
At the moment, if I want to copy from Excel, I'm having to paste it into Notepad and then copying it from there.
I didn't have this issue with Excel 2010. Do you think it could be a setting I need to switch off? I've had a good Google for this but I only seem to find how to copy as a picture, which is the complete opposite that I want to do!
EDIT:
I'm not the only person who is getting this issue - someone else in my office who is using Windows 10 and Excel 2013 is having the exact same problem. There must be a setting somewhere that we're missing...

I googled your issue. It's a Skype Feature, not an Excel bug.
Paste Unformatted in Skype:
Ctrl+Shift+V
It's a Skype Feature, not an Excel bug. (Source)

Related

Refreshing excel formula / links

this may be a dumb question. I'm no excel expert by any means. But i have to use an evaluation / formula in excel.
I have 3 sheets. Rohdaten (=meaning raw data), where i pasta the data into. And ExpProcA or B. => there the data is referenced and calculations done. The links are like this: =Rohdaten!AW3
I wanted to paste the data via Python / PANDAS. Its all working well, i can paste it via XLSWriter and such. And i also can open it and "refresh" it. I will add the open command and refresh later. But thats not the problem.
Here lies my problem, which i can't solve. The ExpProcA/B and my file says: Some references in your sheet can't be refreshed. Then i can press -> okay or edit references.
But the data/reference is there, if in the ExpProcB sheet i go to A2, B2, C2, D2 where #REF / #BEZUG(german) stands and press enter = its working.
Then i can select this 4 cells and fill all down below without formatting.
How would i solve this / do a real auto update without pressing enter and filling down? I tried every (auto) update option in Excel, turned off any security setting in my Excel settings. But it doesn't happen.
Or is there an easy way to import calculations from XLS into Python? Then i could skip pasting into excel, do calculations there and the stuff of opening/writing/extracting from excel via Python PANDAS.
So, i may think, that there is something off with the file. I'm using the latest version of MS365 / excel.
Here is a screenshot of the cell with the reference and "error" message:
Thanks in advance.
Best Regards
Tim Rachul
I used the file, pasted data in, thought it would refresh => it doesnt. Tried everything with auto updates and settings, but i can't solve it

Excel is unfilling calculated cells at random

I have an Excel file on SharePoint.
Multiple people edit said file.
Offline and online.
Excel unfills all calculated cells (VLOOKUP and MATCH) that depend on other sheets in the same workbook at random.
So if you would open or reload that file, suddenly all the cells that use VLOOKUP or MATCH would be blank.
Upon further investigation nobody changed anything or deleted anything.
It just happens randomly.
Now it has happened 2 weeks ago and just today.
I have an interim solution that is to go to a cell with a formula, hit return, then click „overwrite all cells in this column with this formula“ and then click undo to prevent custom cell content to be overwritten.
Everything is back to normal afterwards.
I talked to a colleague, he has the exact same issue also totally at random.
He also encountered this on files that are not being edited by multiple people but himself.
So it is not dependent on the file itself.
Could the language play into this problem?
On some PCs Excel is in English and on some in German.
=IFERROR(IF(ISNA(VLOOKUP(D185,Sheet1!$B$3:$D$616,3,FALSE)),(VLOOKUP(D185,'Sheet2'!$B$3:$D$22200,3,FALSE)),(VLOOKUP(D185,Sheet1!$B$3:$D$616,3,FALSE))),"")
Seems like your sheet isn't calculating upon open. See if this link is of use to you.
https://superuser.com/questions/448376/what-is-the-excel-hotkey-to-re-calculate-all-formula-in-sheet
Also check your program settings and see if auto-calculate sheets is enabled. Don't know from the top of my head where it is located.
Alternative create a small vba function to force recalculate on workbook open.
Getting Excel to refresh data on sheet from within VBA

Pasting Excel tables in Thunderbird e-mail client

When I paste an Excel table in Thunderbird e-mail client (ver 24.2.0) the table looses its formatting. One workaround seems to be that you paste the table from Excel to Word and then paste it in Thunderbird. But this seems a bit odd as Word and Excel are part of the same Office Suite of applications, yet their behavior is strange.
Can anybody shed any light on it?
Copy from Excel,
Paste into word -> Paste Options -> Keep Source formatting,
then highlight the table, Go to Design -> on the right, Increase the "Line Weight" to a minimum of 1 point, then click on "Borders" and select "All Borders"
Now copy this table and paste it in your Email. It should work.
The fastest way to copy excel tables as they are, in Thunderbird is to first copy the table to Word, and then recopy and paste within html email.
Colors, lines, format are kept as they are...
Another workaround you can do entirely within Excel is copy the cells for your table, pasted as a picture in Excel and then copy/cut the picture from Excel and then paste to Thunderbird. You lose the ability to edit in place in Thunderbird, and increase the size of the email but you keep all the formatting from Excel.
So far,the best solution is paste the table into Word and then copy from there.
This is a bug from 2003 Reference Link,but didn‘t fix it.
Paste the table as it is in mail from excel, then go to
Format --> Table --> Table Properties
In Borders & Spacing, keep the Borders as- 1 or 2 pixels.
It is working 100%
This is a bug in thunderbird. I overcome this by using LibreOffice (or open office) spreadsheet. Formatting is not lost when we copy from Libreoffice Calc. Thunderbird development is a bit lousy :-). Keeping this bug open for long time.
try to use "Text To column" function under the "DATA" TAB
it will make the column suitable to be pasted as a text

Pasting the same text copied from different sources behaves differently in Excel

Now this is a weird one
We have a project where we are reading some data from an Excel spreadsheet. Obviously this data has to be in a certain format. Some of the fields consists of numbers, but should be treated as text.
To stop Excel from being "smart" and change the cell types, I have set the format in the respective cells to 'text'.
Now here is the problem: some of the numbers we're pasting have spacing between the digits. When we remove the white spaces, Excel change the cell format to 'standard' and turn the text into the 2.42805E+11 format.
BUT: this only happens when the text is copied from some sources. If a paste a number copied from a textbox, everything turn out fine when we edit the spaces. If we copy the exact same number from a web page, Excel change cell format.
I thought copy-paste would be copy-paste, but obviously some formating or something gets along on the ride.
Does anyone know what causes this, or know have to get Excel to stop being "smart" with the formating?
EDIT: I found a somewhat peculiar solution to this. I recorded a macro that uses the 'Paste Special' function with text as parameter, and overrided ctrl-v with it (in that particular spreadsheet). Works like a charm! Feels a bit "hacky", though. Can anyone think of a scenario where this will backfire?
Try using the Edit Paste Special command, it will give you some controls to choose what to do with the data.
For a taste of the complexity of what is really going on underneath, look in MSDN about Clipboard Formats. In short, it isn't all Excel's fault...
A common user trick copying data out of excel is to paste it into Notepad and cut it back to the clipboard, which flattens all the formatting down to plain text. It won't help you for pasting data into Excel, however.
Copy-paste in windows retains formatting. One way to get rid of the formatting is to paste the text into e.g. notepad first, then select and copy it again. This loses any copied formatting.

Array Formulas in Conditional Formatting of Excel XML Spreadsheet files?

Excel usually treats Conditional Formatting formulas as if they are array formulas, except when loading them from an Excel 2002/2003 XML Spreadsheet file.
This is only an issue with the Excel 2002/2003 XML Spreadsheet format... the native Excel format works fine, as does the newer Excel 2007 XML format (xlsx).
After loading the spreadsheet, it is possible to make it work correctly by selecting the formatted range, going to the Conditional Formatting dialog, and clicking OK--but this only fixes the problem for the session.
Test case:
Enter the following into a new sheet:
A B C
1 N N N
2 x x x
3 x x x
Create this conditional format formula on cells A1:C1 (your choice of pretty colors for the format):
=(SUM(($A1:$C1="N")*($A$2:$C$2=A$3))>0)
This is an array formula that activates for A1, B1, and C1 whenever any of them has an "N" and the cell in row 2 below the "N" is equal to the cell in row 3 of the current column.
(This has been simplified from a real-world business spreadsheet. Sorry for the complexity of the test case, I am trying to find an easier test case to present here.)
And it works... you can alter the N's or the x's in any way you want and the formatting works just fine.
Save this as an XML Spreadsheet. Close Excel, and re-open the file. Formatting is now broken. Now, you can only activate conditional formatting if A1 is an "N" and A2 is the same as A3, B3, or C3. The values of B1, B2, C1, and C2 have no effect on the formatting.
Now, select A1:C1 and look at the conditional formatting formula. Exactly the same as before. Hit OK. Conditional formatting starts working again, and will work during the entire session the file is open.
Workarounds considered:
Providing the file in native (BIFF) Excel format. Not an option, these spreadsheets are generated on the fly by a web server and this is only one of dozens of types of workbooks generated dynamically by our system.
Providing the file in the Excel 2007 native XML format (xlsx). Not an option, current user base does not have Office 2007 or the compatibility plug-in.
Asking users to select the range, enter the Conditional Formatting dialog, and hitting ok. Not an option in this case, unsophisticated users.
Asking users to open the XML spreadsheet, save as native XLS, close, and re-open the XLS file. This does not work! Formatting remains broken in the native XLS format if it was loaded broken from an XML file. If (3) above is performed before saving, the XLS file will work properly.
I ended up rewriting the conditional formatting to not use array formulas. So I guess this is "answered" to some degree, but it's still an undocumented, if obscure, bug in Excel 2002/2003's handling of XML files.
I tried to recreate the problem you describe. Here is what I found.
Could consistently recreate the
problem using Excel 2003 on Windows
XP when saving as an XML
spreadsheet.
Could not reproduce the problem
using Excel 2003 on Windows XP when
saving as a standard xls
spreadsheet.
Could not reproduce the problem
using Excel 2007 on Windows Vista
when saving the file in the native
xlsx format.
Could not reproduce the problem
using Excel 2007 on Windows Vista
when saving the file in the Excel
97-2003 xls format.
(Note: All instances of Excel and Windows are current with all Windows updates.)
I also added a simple conditional formatting formula to each test. In every case, it worked as expected after saving the file, closing Excel, and reopening the file.
So the answer seems to be to use the standard Excel 2003 file format when saving the file.
BTW, this is a very odd formatting formula. It is difficult to imagine how you would use it. It must be a very specific & unusual business case. I also have the feeling something is missing in your post. (I'm not accusing you of being dishonest – just wondering if you may have shortened the formula for readability.) If this is not the exact formula you are using, please edit your original post with the complete formula and I will be happy to revisit this issue.
You can find some tutorial videos for self studying the conditional formatting issue over the following pages:
conditional formatting

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