Microsoft KB Archive/168234

= XL97: Hyphens and Apostrophes Are Sorted After Alphabetic Letters =

PSS ID Number: 168234

Article Last Modified on 10/22/2000

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The information in this article applies to:


 * Microsoft Excel 97 for Windows

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This article was previously published under Q168234





SUMMARY
In Microsoft Excel 97, the hyphen character (-) and the apostrophe character (') are ignored when you perform a sort. The "Default sort orders" Help topic in Microsoft Excel Help states that the apostrophe character and the hyphen character are sorted before any alphabetic characters. This information is incorrect.



MORE INFORMATION
This sorting behavior is new in Microsoft Excel 97. As a result of the new sorting behavior, you may experience one or more of the following problems:


 * Cell entries containing hyphens and apostrophes may be sorted differently than they were in earlier versions of Excel.
 * When you compare the relative values of two text strings, you may receive a different answer than you do in earlier versions of Excel.
 * The VLOOKUP function may return a different value than it does in earlier versions of Microsoft Excel.

This sort order behavior is designed be consistent with Microsoft Windows. Sorting in Microsoft Word 97 also ignores the apostrophe character and the hyphen character. The sort order in Microsoft Word 7.0 does not do this.

