Become a Formatting Ninja

I hope your weekend is going well, and that you are able to spend a bit of time with your family or friends. I wanted to remind you about the updated edition of Excel Custom Formats, which I announced about 10 days ago. I've received some good comments from those who have taken the time to check out the new edition.

If you haven't checked it out, you really should. Why? Because this new edition of Excel Custom Formats is on sale right now, but it will only be on sale through this coming Wednesday. Through then you can get your own copy, either as a download or on CD-ROM, for 30% off the regular price.

Excel Custom Formats contains everything you could want to know about how to apply powerful formatting to the cells in a worksheet. With the information in these e-books, you won't be bound by the common, built-in formats provided by Excel.

Make sure you check out Excel Custom Formats today, before this special offer is gone. More information is here:

https://store.tips.net/T010132

Thanks for your continued support of ExcelTips.

—Allen

ExcelTips (ribbon) for 18 April 2026

Address of the First Blank Cell in a Column

If you have a mixture of text, numbers, and blank cells in a column, you may want to determine the address of the first blank cell. This tip presents a wide array of formulas you can use for this purpose.

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(Thanks to Ryszard Raciborski, Alex Blankenburg, Steve Aprahamian, Andrija Vrcan, Michael Avidan (MVP), Brian Dorey, Rick Rothstein, John Vander Linden, James Woolley, Jacques Raubenheimer, Michael Jarvis, and David Watssman for contributing to this tip.)

Getting Rid of All Rows Except the One for the Latest Date

As you use Excel to collect data over time, sometimes winnowing out the latest data can present a challenge. Here are a couple of ways you can get just the data you need.

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Macros! Macros! Get Your Macros Here!

Learn all the best methods for creating and using Excel macros. ExcelTips: The Macros is the best single source for learning about macros or improving your existing skills. Be the person everyone looks to when something needs to happen in Excel. Get yours today!

Using Very Long Worksheet Tab Names

Excel places a limit on how many characters you can use in a worksheet name. This tip discusses that limit and provides some easy workarounds you could try if you need to use longer names.

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Displaying Letter Grades

Grading in schools is often done using numeric values. However, you may want to change those numeric values into letter grades based upon a determined scale. This can be done most easily using Excel's lookup functions.

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Help Wanted

This section is for those having problems making Excel behave. If Excel is giving you fits, feel free to submit your own Help Wanted question.

If you have a solution for the problems below, click the link after the problem to send us your answer. (All responses become the sole property of Sharon Parq Associates, Inc., and can be used in any way deemed appropriate.) If your response is used in a future issue, you will be credited for your contribution to the answer.

Extracting Numbers from a Text String

I have inherited a workbook that includes several hundred text values in column C. Many of these include, within the text, a number that is surrounded by parentheses, such as "Falcon (123) Vector". I need to extract those numbers. The number can have different numbers of digits, it can be in different places in the text, and not all cells may include a number or parentheses. Can this be done with a formula, or would a macro work best?
—Bob Wilson (provide an answer for this Help Wanted question)

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