Disregard Blank Cells while using Conditional Format?

[Portland_Blue]

I just started a job that sometimes requires a lot of excel usage (and knowledge), so I am extremely excited to find this website and such a large collective of Excel brains!
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Currently, I have an excel workbook that has 5 sheets in it, all with the same general template (it’s an accounting spreadsheet with the same headers)- I need to make it so that various cells in the middle columns fill with various colors depending on the value (e.g. -2 to + 2 = yellow, less than -2 = red, and greater than +2 = green).
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In order to expedite this process, I tried selecting all sheets, then selecting columns D-F (where the cells are located), and applying conditional formatting (using “Cell Value is” and “Value is less than -2 = red” and so forth).

However, doing so colors every empty cell in columns D-F yellow! Is there a way to fix this?
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Thanks very much for your assistance!

 

[JackDanIce]

Welcome to the board

Do you want this:
Sheet1

<TABLE style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff; PADDING-LEFT: 2pt; PADDING-RIGHT: 2pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial,Arial; FONT-SIZE: 8pt" border=1 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0><COLGROUP><COL style="WIDTH: 30px; FONT-WEIGHT: bold"><COL style="WIDTH: 56px"><COL style="WIDTH: 63px"></COLGROUP><TBODY><TR style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #cacaca; FONT-SIZE: 8pt; FONT-WEIGHT: bold"><TD></TD><TD>A</TD><TD>B</TD></TR><TR style="HEIGHT: 19px"><TD style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #cacaca; FONT-SIZE: 8pt">1</TD><TD style="TEXT-ALIGN: right; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffff00">-1</TD><TD style="TEXT-ALIGN: right; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffff00">1</TD></TR><TR style="HEIGHT: 19px"><TD style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #cacaca; FONT-SIZE: 8pt">2</TD><TD style="TEXT-ALIGN: right; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffff00">1</TD><TD></TD></TR><TR style="HEIGHT: 19px"><TD style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #cacaca; FONT-SIZE: 8pt">3</TD><TD style="TEXT-ALIGN: right">3</TD><TD style="TEXT-ALIGN: right; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffff00">1</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>

The conditional formatting rule I've used in A1 (then copied to the other cells) is, for when the condition is true so apply the formatting:

AND(LEN(A1)>0,ABS(A1)<3)

I'm using Excel 2007, though I think this should work in 2003

 

[Portland_Blue]

Hi JDI:
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What you posted is what I’m looking for, in its simplest form; essentially, if there are values in the cell, -2 to +2 = yellow, less than -2 = red, greater than +2 = green.
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Right now the sheet has the conditional formatting applied to it already, with the values being -5 to +5 = yellow (and so on; the percentages used to be 5’s and now I need to change them to 2’s).
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The original person who worked with this sheet applied conditional formatting using “cell value is” conditions for the 3 values (and 3 colors), and for some reason I can’t apply a 4<SUP>th</SUP> condition (the formula that you gave me).
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I’ve attached a copy of the sheet here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/60846417@N03/5860156857/sizes/l/in/photostream/
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Essentially, when I highlight columns D,E and F and apply conditional formatting (just by going into the existing conditional formatting and changing the values from 5’s to 2’s), it changes EVERY blank cell (to yellow); I imagine it’s because excel counts blank cells as “0,” which is between -2 and +2, but I’m not sure how to overcome this- again, it won’t let me apply a 4<SUP>th</SUP> condition to the sheet.

Thanks again, JDI! Your help is much appreciated!
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-PortlandBlue