Default Category Number Formats Different than Previous

CAUSE

This behavior occurs when you apply a number format by selecting a category, but you do not select a specific format code. Some of these "default" number formats in Microsoft Excel versions 7.0 and 97 are custom formats, and are different from the defaults applied by default in earlier versions of Microsoft Excel.

Note that Microsoft Excel versions 7.0 and 97 contain all of the formatting codes that are available in Microsoft Excel version 5.0, with the addition of several special formatting codes.

The following table contains the number format category, the category default format codes applied in Microsoft Excel version 5.0, and the default category format codes applied in versions 7.0 and 97.

 Category      Version 5.0 Default          Versions 7.0/97 Default
              Category Format Codes          Category Format Codes
 ------------------------------------------------------------------

 Custom             General                        General

 Number                0                            0.00

 Accounting   _($* #,##0_);_($* (#,##0);   _($* #,##0.00_);_($*
(#,##0.00);
                  _($* "-"_);_(@_)           _($* "-"??_);_(@_)

 Date               m/d/yy                           m/d

 Time             h:mm AM/PM                         h:mm

 Percentage           0%                             0.00%

 Fraction            # ?/?                           # ?/?

 Scientific         0.00E+01                        0.00E+01

 Text                  @                              @

 Currency         $#,##0_);($#,##0)               $#,##0.00
				

The following table contains the number format category, and the difference in appearance between the default formatting in Microsoft Excel version 5.0 and versions 7.0 and 97.

 Category          Appearance In        Appearance In
                    version 5.0        versions 7.0/97
 -----------------------------------------------------

 Custom                 34                  34

 Number                  5                5.00

 Accounting         $4,500           $4,500.00

 Date               3/4/95                 3/4

 Time             12:00 AM                12:00

 Percentage            34%              34.00%

 Fraction              4.5                 4.5

 Scientific       8.59E+12            8.59E+12

 Text             8                   8

 Currency               $2               $2.34