Slashes suddenly missing from default dates after upgrade to Windows 10

[JenLL]

Hello! We recently upgraded from Windows 7 to Windows 10, using our old copy of MS Office 2010. I have noticed that all the spreadsheets I have suddenly had slashes missing. So 5/16/16 now reads as 5 16 16.

So, I looked at the number formats, and it looks like the slash has been completely eradicated from all date formats.

Now, I'm dyslexic, and I literally cannot read the dates correctly without being parsed by the slash, or something similar. So:

1. Does anyone know a way to restore the slashes?
2. If not, does anyone know how to tell Excel to accept a custom date format at the default date format?

Thank you!

 

[thisoldman]

Does this happen only with Excel? Are dates in other programs affected? Can you type the forward slash alone in an Excel cell and have it display properly?

Perhaps it's the Windows short date setting? You can check:

Go to the Control Panel—right click on the Start button (the Windows logo). Select Control Panel. In the Control Panel, under "Clock, Language, and Region," select "Change date, time, or number formats." A dialog box should pop up where you can change the "Short date" format.

 

[JenLL]

Thank you for getting back to me!

1. Yes, it's only in Excel. The windows short date setting is displaying slashes correctly, and when I go into Word to input a date field, the date fields with slashes are correct.

2. I was having a problem with not being able to type a slash in Excel, but I went into Options, Advanced, and removed the slash as the Microsoft Excel Menu Key under Lotus Compatibility, and now that problem has been corrected. I have tried leaving that field blank, and putting in a different key, neither of these things has corrected the missing slashes from the excel numbers formats.

 

[Dave Patton]

a) Access Format Cells shortcut Crtl+1 then Numbers then Date
At the bottom of that screen is a Locale (Location) drop down. Check if one of the countries has a format that you require.

and/or

b) Check your regional settings in Windows Control Panel and change to a country with the format that you require.

and/or

c) With a blank workbook, create a cell formatting style with the formatting that you prefer and save the workbook as a template. Use this template for future workbooks.

 

[JenLL]

a) Doesn't quite work. All slashes are absent from all time displays. Looks like the best I can do is Albanian, which does yy-mm-dd.

b) Doesn't work. While date displays in Word are obviously tied to the date format set for Windows, there does not seem to be a similar correlation in Excel.

c) Yeah, I think I'm going with this. Thank you.

I'm not going to say this is the WEIRDEST thing I've seen Excel do, but it's definitely up in the top twenty. I think the weirdest thing is that the dates don't even display slashes in the formula bar. Once we're completely done with the upgrade, I might run a repair/reinstall just to see if that fixes things.