seperating fields - excel

[xirokx]

Hi,

is there a way to seperate fields in excel?

so for example:-

COLUMN A COLUMN B COLUMN C ETC ETC
MR APPLE APPLES, APPLE ST APPLE LANE, APPLETON APPLE11111

So I wanna seperate column b so "apple st" will go into a new column and the same for column c...

I have a 1000 to do..

pls help

thanks in advance..

 

[Tomsk]

If you have a text file of all the data, use the import function in Excel.

If you don't have a text file of all the data, make one, using cut and paste and notepad.

 

[xirokx]

but i need the finished version to be in excel??

i dont quite get how creating a notepad file will enable me to put it in a spreadsheet format seperated by fields?

pls clarify

thanks

 

[rpstewart]

but i need the finished version to be in excel??

i dont quite get how creating a notepad file will enable me to put it in a spreadsheet format seperated by fields?

pls clarify

thanks

The easiest way of getting bulk data into Excel is importing from an external file. The easiest way of creating said external file is pasting stuff into notepad. You will however, have to consider what the field delimiter is going to be, normally it'll be a comma or a tab but any character will do or if you want to be really old school you can use a fixed width file with variable length padding between the data so that it all lines up.

What format is your input data in at the moment?

 

[uv]

data > text to columns, separate by commas

job done.

 

[Tomsk]

but i need the finished version to be in excel??

i dont quite get how creating a notepad file will enable me to put it in a spreadsheet format seperated by fields?

pls clarify

thanks

Your data is already in excel, so select it all and copy.
Open up a blank notepad file and paste the data into there.
Save the notepad file somewhere.
In Excel go File -> Open. You will need to change the "Files of type" to txt to see the notepad file you just created.
Excel will guide you through how you want the data to be organised.

 

[uv]

Your data is already in excel, so select it all and copy.
Open up a blank notepad file and paste the data into there.
Save the notepad file somewhere.
In Excel go File -> Open. You will need to change the "Files of type" to txt to see the notepad file you just created.
Excel will guide you through how you want the data to be organised.

Extremely convoluted - if the data is already *in* Excel, and in one column, then text_to_columns will do the job in, like, three clicks. It even goes through a wizard, so someone who hasn't used it before will figure it out easily.

 

[Tomsk]

Extremely convoluted - if the data is already *in* Excel, and in one column, then text_to_columns will do the job in, like, three clicks. It even goes through a wizard, so someone who hasn't used it before will figure it out easily.

Nice.
I've never used that function before. I'm always using keyboard shortcuts so I never look at menus.