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A 3rd party software 'Eclipse Orchestrator' saves its config file as 'csv' format. Among other things it includes camera exposure times like '1/2000' to indicate a 1/2000 sec exposure. Here a sample line from the csv file:

FOR,(VAR),0.000,5.000,49.000 TAKEPIC,MAGPRE (VAR),-,00:01:10.0,EOS450D,1/2000,9.0,100,0.000,RAW+FL,,N,Partial 450D ENDFOR

When the csv file is loaded into Excel the screen display reads 'Jan-00'. So Excel interprets the string 1/2000 as a date. When the file is saved again as csv and inspected in an ascii editor it reads:

FOR,(VAR),0,5,49,,,,,,,, TAKEPIC,MAGPRE (VAR),-,01:10.0,EOS450D,Jan-00,9,100,0,RAW+FL,,N,Partial 450D ENDFOR,,,,,,,,,,,,
  1. I had hoped to use Excel to variablearize the data and make it easier changeable. But the conversion to fake dates is not helping here.
  2. The conversion at load-time affects the saved data format making it then unreadable for the 'Eclipse Orchestrator' program.

Any way to save the day in Excel, or just move on to write a prog to do the patching of the csv file?

Thanks, Gert

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If you import the CSV file instead of opening it, you can use the import wizard (Data ribbon > From Text) to define the data type of each column. Select Text for the exposure time and Excel will not attempt to convert it.

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Good point. Can you elaborate if turning the data into text will affect putting then into formulas. I.e. if I want to put a formula into the cell for the exposure time to pick it up from an area at the top of the page to enter manually for all lines where the exposure shows up. I have about 200lines to deal with and all have an exposure time and I want to control them from a single input.
Once you have imported the text or csv file into Excel, you can save the file as an Excel workbook, and then you can use formulas to work with the data. If you enter formulas and then save back as a CSV file, the CSV file will have the formula results, not the formulas themselves. So, yes, you can use formulas and yes you can control the behaviour. You just need to understand what you are doing when you use CSV files.

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