Re: Exprting data into Excel drops leading zero

Not really Microsoft's fault.  It is Surveyor/400s fault.  They are
exporting improperly.

When you export to CSV, it just dumps everything as a string.  Excel "auto
formats" the data base don what it reads in.  If everything is numeric, it
assumes it is a number and kills the leading zeros.

Now, if Surveyor was exporting correctly, they would be assigning the cells
as a text format so Excel knows not to treat them as numbers.

If you use the Client Access data transfer utility, and transfer to an XLS
file, the XLS file will keep the proper formatting for fields like zip codes
and such if they are defined as strings on the AS/400.  They coded it
correctly.

This is not something to blame on Microsoft.  Surveyor/400 is doing a poor
job of exporting.  I have written a variety of VB programs that work with
data on the AS/400 and I dump data to a spreadsheet and it is very simple to
programmatically format the cell before you dump the data to it.  I would
consider it a bug in Surveyor's part.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Dennis Munro" <DMunro@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "'PC Technical Discussion for iSeries Users'" <pctech@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2004 2:29 PM
Subject: RE: [PCTECH] Exprting data into Excel drops leading zero


> I'm using Surveyor/400 to do the export & I've talked to them about the
> situation.  I'm guessing it is Uncle Bill because in csv format the data
is
> all there.  Even importing this csv file into Excel the zeros are dropped.
>
> Thanks - Dennis.
>
> Dennis Munro
>
> "I love deadlines. I especially like the whooshing sound they make as they
> go flying by."
> Dilbert's Words Of Wisdom
>
> Badger Mining Corporation
> www.badgerminingcorp.com
> dmunro@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> (920) 361-2388   Ext.141