Using a Single Digit for a Year

Excel works very well with dates and times. One thing you cannot do, however, is to create a custom format that displays a single digit for a year. This tip looks at a couple of ways you can get around this limitation.

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(Thanks to Michael Avidan (MVP), Harold Druss, Ryszard Raciborski, Steve Aprahamian, Stephen Argent, Henk Haringsma, Ron Solecki, Howe Shou, David Gray, Robert Williams, Patrick Sedgwick, Tomek Dluzniewski, Wayne Edmondson, Corrie Buitendag, Fred van der Meulen, David Teece, Norman Harker, James Hoyt, and Mike Dawson for contributing to this tip.)

Printing Workbooks in a Folder

This tip presents two techniques you can use to print multiple workbooks all at the same time. Both techniques involve creating selection sets and then acting on those sets.

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Smoothing Out Data Series

One way you can make your charts look more understandable is by removing the "jaggies" that are inherent to line charts. This is done through a process called smoothing.

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Partially Blocking Social Security Numbers

Need to protect a series of Social Security Numbers in a worksheet? The techniques provided in this tip might be a good starting point for your endeavors.

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Renaming a File

Need to rename a file in a macro? It's easy to do using the Name command, as discussed in this tip.

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Extracting Numbers within a Range

If you have a large number of values in a column, you may want to move the values that meet specific criteria to another column. This tip examines several different approaches to such a need.

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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.

Automatically Displaying Thumbnails of a Graphic File

I have a worksheet that includes a column containing filenames such as "abcdef." This corresponds to a JPG file ("abcdef.jpg") in the same folder as the worksheet. Is there a way to make Excel automatically display, in the cell just to the right of the filename, a thumbnail of the JPG file?
—Ron Takens (provide an answer for this Help Wanted question)