Find and Replace

[Obied70]

This one is a little bit silly and less a problem than a nuisance. I have spreadsheets I use as templates for each month as we move through the year. This month for example, I need to replace "Sep" with "Oct." Simple enough you say? Yes it is. However, here is what happens. I have a few spots where the letter "v" is at the end of a word/acronym, ie. Rev, GPV. Okay so we do the find/replace and I end up with...ReOct and GPOct. What gives?!

 

[Joe4]

Sounds like you are replacing "v" with "Oct" in that case. I would double-check to make sure that you did not make some error.

Also, is "Sep" the entire contents of the cell?
If so, then and click on the "Match entire cell contents" option on the Replace tab (under Options).
This will ensure that you will only replace instances where the full entry matches (and not just any part).

And here is another option you may want to consider in your template.
Try having the month in one single cell (let's say A1).
Then, in all your other month references, use "=A1" instead of hard-coding it in.
Then each month, you only need to update cell A1 and all the others cells will be updated automatically.

 

[Obied70]

It's strange I know. So all of the "Sep" that need to get changed, are being changed to "Oct", it's just those other two instances where there is a v at the end of a string. Like I said, not a big deal just curious as to what excel gremlin is causing that. At this point, doing the find/replace is easier than changing all 40 or so cells to reference ha.

 

[Joe4]

At this point, doing the find/replace is easier than changing all 40 or so cells to reference ha.

In the short term (i.e. this month), but over the long haul, probably not. It is one of those instances in which a little work up-front will save you a lot of work down the road.

And it also eliminates the possibility of the strange errors you are experiencing from happening, or other unintended replacements (i.e. if you are not replacing the whole word, you could also make other unintended replacement, i.e. if you were replacing "Mar" with "Apr" and you had words on your sheet like "Mark" or "Market").

So all of the "Sep" that need to get changed, are being changed to "Oct", it's just those other two instances where there is a v at the end of a string

I really do not see how that can happen, other than user error. If you would like to upload the template to a file sharing site for us to look at and test, we will take a look at it.