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# Incorrect Display of Extended Character in Field Name

Article ID: 124231

Article Last Modified on 8/15/2005

APPLIES TO

- Microsoft Excel 95 Standard Edition
- Microsoft Excel 5.0c
- Microsoft Query 2000

This article was previously published under Q124231

## SYMPTOMS

In Microsoft Query, when you use a Paradox, dBASE, or Microsoft FoxPro data source, and you add a table with a field that contains an extended character, one of the following may occur:

- The extended character in the field name is displayed as a plus sign (+), a hyphen (-), a vertical bar (|), or an underscore (_). -or-
- The extended character in the field name is displayed as the regular alpha character without the diacritical mark. Note that this behavior may occur when you use a dBASE 3 or dBASE 4 file created in Microsoft Excel.

Additionally, if the only difference between any two field names is the extended character, such as All (where A is the letter A with the caret symbol) and All (where A the letter A with the dieresis symbol), you receive the following error message when you add a field to the Data pane
Non unique column reference: <column>
where <column> is the column name as displayed in the table.

## WORKAROUND

The best way to avoid this behavior is to avoid using extended characters in field names when you create a table that you are going to use in Microsoft Query. However, if you must use extended characters in the table field names, make sure that the field names differ from each other by more than just the extended character.
In Microsoft Query, version 2.0, you may not receive an error message when duplicate field names are added. However, the duplicate fields will only show values from the first occurrence of the field name.

Additional query words: 5.00c MSQUERY

Keywords: KB124231