Microsoft Excel Numbers Lose Center Across Selection Alignment

• Microsoft Word for Windows, versions 1.0, 1.1, 1.1a, 2.0, 2.0a, 2.0a-CD, 2.0b, 2.0c, 6.0, 6.0a, 6.0c
• Microsoft Excel for Windows, version 4.0, 4.0a, 5.0

SYMPTOMS

When you paste Center-Across-Selection-formatted cells from a Excel worksheet into Word for Windows, text will come in aligned correctly in columns; however, numbers will not.

CAUSE

The Center Across Selection alignment format allows a cell entry--text or numbers--to be centered across a selection of cells. For example, you can center a number in the first column across the first three columns. When you paste a selection of cells that contain this formatting into a Word for Windows document, text will come in properly aligned, but numbers will not be aligned across the cells. In the above example, the number would come into Word for Windows back in its original location, the first column.

WORKAROUND

• To bring in number values properly aligned across cells, insert an apostrophe (') in front of each number. This forces Microsoft Excel to read the numbers as text. The number will still appear the same in Microsoft Excel and will paste into Word for Windows centered across the desired cells; however, this method will disable the number from being used in any equations in Microsoft Excel.

  -or-

• When pasting the cells into Word for Windows, choose Paste Special from the Edit menu, and select either Microsoft Excel Worksheet Object, Picture, or Bitmap. Any of these options will bring in the worksheet data as a picture image and retain the Center Across Selection format.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem when using Microsoft Excel versions 4.0, 5.0 with Word for Windows versions 1.0, 1.1, 1.1a, 2.0, 2.0a, 2.0a-cd, 2.0b, 2.0c, 6.0, 6.0a, 6.0c. We are researching this problem and will post new information here in the Microsoft Knowledge Base as it becomes available.

Note: Word for Windows brings the text over correctly by merging the columns of the table that the text is centered over. In the above example, the text is centered correctly in one cell the width of the combined columns in the table. With the insertion point in the centered text, choose Split Cells from the Table menu; the row with the original number of cells will be displayed.