Excel column format changing from "Number" to "General"

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Posted on 13 Oct 2018 00:48:51 by thiagof

Hello,

Something unusual is happening with my Excel file, the one that I am using as datasource for a powerapp. I have one field (column) named "PK_Location", which I formated as "Number" (the whole column). This is important to me because I need to use some powerapps functions like "Max", and, if the values are not formatted as numbers, apparently I cannot use these functions. What is happening is that after I add new data to my Excel file using the app, the column format changes from "Number" to "General" automatically.

Please, refer to the image files attached to this post.

This has not caused any problem so far. I can still use the Max function without problems. But I am concerned that this can become an issue in the future. Any idea of why it is happening?

Thanks!

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Answers (1)

TyRey 2 on 27 Jul 2020 at 23:04:39

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Re: Excel column format changing from "Number" to "General"

I had a similar problem. Here is what I learned.

If you want to change a field type in an Excel table already attached to the app, you need to disconnect the table in the app, change the field type in Excel, and then reattach the table in Excel.

To be even safer, I've seen instances where I've had to disconnect all tables in the same Excel file and then reattach them post the field type change.

Hope that helps.
thiagof 4 on 13 Oct 2018 at 16:39:43

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Re: Excel column format changing from "Number" to "General"

Hi, tianaranjo.
Thanks!
Yeah, it works using the function "Value".
It is also a solution to treat all the data as text, and use the "SortByColumn" instead of "Max".
Thanks.
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tianaranjo 497 on 13 Oct 2018 at 05:59:37

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Re: Excel column format changing from "Number" to "General"

Are you patching in as a value? For example, Patch... Value(textbox.text)