Please help me understand custom spacing in custom formats

[pcvchriskmg]

Hi,

I am having difficulty understanding spacing in custom formats.

I need to make the 9-digit number 333777097 appear as: 33 37 770 97.

The intuitive solution would seem to be:
##_##_###_##

However that gives: 33377 7 09 7

This does not work.

Through trial and error, I determined that the following works:
#_###_####_###

Obviously I am misunderstanding something at the core of how the spacing works or is calculated.

Could someone please briefly explain to me why the first format fails to work but the second does.

I want to avoid the trial and error process next time!

Thank you in advance,
Chris

 

[Andrew Poulsom]

In a number format, the underscore is a special character meaning leave space for the character that follows. Try ##-##-###-## instead. If you particularly want underscores you can use ##\_##\_###\_##.

 

[JB_Scotland]

Or just leave spaces ## ## ### ##

 

[pcvchriskmg]

Or just leave spaces ## ## ### ##

This is actually what I initially tried. It yields:

333 777 097

Then after a search on Google, I learned about using underscores.

Using the hyphen '-' actually places the '-' into the number itself.

33-37-770-97

 

[Andrew Poulsom]

For me the number format ## ## ### ## gives 33 37 770 97, as I would expect.

 

[pcvchriskmg]

For me the number format ## ## ### ## gives 33 37 770 97, as I would expect.

That's very interesting. Thanks for checking on that.

I'll have to dig deeper to understand why my system's not behaving the way it should.