Björn Helgason wrote: > Somewhere the cell changes from displaying as it does - like date - in > Excel > to a number it has been translated to in J > > It is possibly stored in Excel as a number and Excel has a marking > somewhere > that it is really a date that needs to be translated before it is displayed > If Excel knows it is a date that info must be somewhere in the file - > marking that cell as a date
Unlike sql, excel does not have any date type or any marking that a cell is a date. The magic relies on the cell format string that make a number displayed like a date. eg. you can enter numbers like 80000 and 80001 and the use cell format to make them look like a date. you may even perform numeric calculation like summing to these "date" cells. Because readexcel discard cell format, so only raw data (the number) is left. OTOH it is possible for tara to read format string for each cell but it lacks the facility to format raw data with these format strings. I know vba does have format function but I'm reluctant to use ole. -- regards, bill ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
