Forum Discussion
THERE'S A PROBLEM WITH THIS FORMULA
Hi,
I'm trying to write this formula +1/17.5, when the cell is in "general" format, there's no problem, but when the format is "number" an error pops saying "There is a problem with this formula". Can someone help me?
Yes, as everyone mentioned here, best to start formula with =. Most reliable.
However, from time to time I prefer to use Numpad only, thus formulae start with +. Especially if we use Excel as calculator. No problems on Excel for Web. On Excel desktop, as mentioned,
In general that's 30-years old question, lot of answers could be found.
4 Replies
Yes, as everyone mentioned here, best to start formula with =. Most reliable.
However, from time to time I prefer to use Numpad only, thus formulae start with +. Especially if we use Excel as calculator. No problems on Excel for Web. On Excel desktop, as mentioned,
In general that's 30-years old question, lot of answers could be found.
It's an old Lotus 123 quirk. There is an option to have Excel evaluate it (It's tucked away in advanced options but not worth the trouble because the setting is done sheet-by-sheet.) if you provide "+" instead of "=". It will actually correct the formula for you.
It's best to start formulas with =.It appears you have run into something interesting. So an equation can be preceeded with EITHER "=" or "+" EXCEPT when you start with a "+" it appears to convert any fraction to an explicit number so:
+1/2*3+4-5*6/3
will result in:
=0.5 * 3 + 4 - 5 * 2
Notice how the 1/2 and the 6/3 are converted to 0.5 and 2 respectively.
I don't know why but to your question excel sees the fraction 1/17 (it doesn't see 17.5 as a valid denominator and only uses whole number denominators) and tries to convert it to a number and then appending .5 (it becomes or tries to become =0.0588235294117647 .5 which is 2 numbers without an operator in between) which creates an error. I don't know why it does this but that appears to be what is happening. Furthermore if you have multiple "/" in a row it will act on 'groups' as they are viewed as separate fractions but not further simplify the resulting fraction so +8/4/2/8 becomes =2/0.25 (the 8/4 becomes 2 and the 2/8 becomes 0.25). Also note that having a decimal for a numerator is OK in the sense that excel will NOT convert it so +2.2/2 will result in the formula =2.2/2
As noted by Hans, you are just better off using "=" instead of "+" to preserve your original entry
Formulas in Excel begin with =
Use
=1/17.5
