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Hi team,

I took advantage of the Copy List function to make a spreadsheet version of the BIAB style list. Sadly, some of the names in Excel are #NAME?. Mr. Gates doesn't like those style names and has rudely told me so with his stupid error reporting. There are 4737 records. I don't really want to go through them all and manually fix the names (however that's done??).

I noticed that the Excel program added an equals sign to those cells, therefore, treating them like a function. Where did that come from?

Is there a fast way to get the names right so we don't anger Mr. Gates and his perfect software (NOT!!!). Thanks.

Now, there's another issue. Please take a look at the attached pic. The formatting is all screwed up. Has anyone successfully built an Excel spreadsheet from the Notepad file?

Thanks.

Here is what the Notepad file looks like. I think there's something wrong with how BIAB is exporting the file.

Lee,

BIAB is doing everything correctly, what you are experiencing is a Microsoft quirk and due to how Excel is interpreting the information.

Firstly...

Make sure that you only have "Tab" selected when asked about the delimiter when pasting into Excel. It looks like you might have multiple delimiters presently selected; maybe "Tab" as well as space and/or comma. (The delimiter is what identifies each cell's data. The BIAB list is Tab-delimited.)



Secondly...

If you look at the image below, you can see how the "#Name?" issue occurs with every style that begins with a "=". (See the original name in the formula bar.) This is because Excel uses the equals sign to indicate that what follows it is a formula.



This is easily fixed.

1. Click on the "A" column header to select column A.



2. Press CTRL+F to open Find/Replace.

3. In the 'Find' box type in =

4. In the 'Replace' box type in '=

• The single quotation mark is used by Excel to say "interpret what follows as ordinary text." This character is found beneath the " character. It is not the character that is found beneath the "~" character.

5. Select "Replace all"

While the image below is using OpenOffice, the principle is the same in Excel.



Performing the above should correct everything for you. Let me know how you go.

Regards,
Noel

Thanks for chiming in, Noel.

After I pressed Copy List, that exact message boxed appeared but there was no prompt to ask what kind of delimiter to use. The Notepad program appeared and I selected All (Ctrl+A),and then pasted it into Excel.

I tried a similar idea to your Find and Replace. I used, Find "=", and replace it with nothing. All the #NAME errors disappeared. Thanks for that. I just need to understand more about the delimiter. I know what it is, but how do I set it without the appearance of a dialog box? Thanks again.

- Lee

Lee,

Rather than replace the = with nothing, it would be better to replace it with '= as suggested above because the style in BIAB actually begins with the = symbol. This symbol indicates that that the style is a mixture of Realtracks and midi. Styles that have 'nothing' leading the name are midi-only styles. (A leading ' character will not be visible in a cell.)

In relation to the delimiters...

1. Save the file in Notepad as a .txt file.

2. Open Excel and navigate to the saved file and open it. As far as I'm aware, Excel interprets .txt files as tab-delimited.

Here's an article that seems to support my understanding.

http://www.ehow.com/how_12014808_open-tab-delimited-files-excel.html

Regards,
Noel

P.S. It wasn't clear in my original article (now corrected) but the time to choose delimiters is when pasting into Excel. The tab-delimited text is already set in place when leaving BIAB and cannot be changed.

Okay, thanks Noel. I'll give it a try. Didn't know the difference between replacing with "'=" versus "=". Wow, thanks for that one. Darn near upset the apple cart!

Excellent.

Also... There are probably midi-only variations of the styles that have a leading = so removing the sign could potentially cause confusion.

Hi Noel,

I tired right-clicking the .txt file in C:\bb\Data and opening it with Excel. It worked fine, however, the #NAME? error messages were gone and I had to use the Find and Replace "=" with "", not "'=" as you suggested. That didn't work. The styles were originally displayed as, "=-PAT34BL" (for example). Using your method gave me "'-PAT34BL", which is no good.

Here's a more important issue. There appears to be a conflict in how BIAB wants us to open the .txt file. The Message box gives us two alternatives. It says to "open it with Excel" or "copy and paste into Excel from Notepad" These give two entirely different results. The latter one gives the #NAME? errors but not the former. Should the latter method be removed from the Message box?

One more issue: when I use the right-click and open with option, the TSig column shows as 42464 (for example). I have no idea how to tell Excel it needs to be displayed as 4/4 (if that's its true identity). The other issue is, the #Instr and #substyles column numbers will not center. Only the headings do. BIAB must be inserting some conflicting formatting.

In this so-called wonderful technological world, there is always some massive incompatibility among computer programs. Very annoying!!!!!

What do you suggest? I use Excel 2007, by the way. Thanks.

Okay, I found this article on how to over-ride the number column formatting (for number columns that won't center).

1. Select the entire column
2. Select the Data tab
3. Press the Text to Columns button under Data Tools.
4. For Step 1 press Next.
5. For Step 2 press Next.
6. For Step 3 select Text as the Column data format, and then press Finish.

By the way, columns (and their headings) containing integers are supposed to be centered. Columns containing decimal quantities are aligned on the decimal points. That's why Peter needs to hire a technical writer .

P.S. The procedure in this post is copied and pasted from the internet. It is also formatted completely wrong. I was too busy to fix it completely .

Hi Lee,

The options BIAB mentions are simply the possible ways that you might wish to use the information.

One reason that Excel might treat the two processes slightly differently is because one is via the clipboard from a Windows application and the second is by using a .txt file.

To double-check this, do what I suggested in my above post. When Notepad opens, save the Notepad file as a txt file (maybe on your desktop for convenience). Then open that txt file and see if it makes a difference.

If the "#NAME?" error does not occurring when you open a .txt file, there shouldn't be any need to use find and replace. I'm surprised that you are getting the ' in a cell. I was not aware that Excel showed that when it was used in the leading position.

• Just to clarify... have you been using the single quote mark ' found beneath " and not the ` sign found under the ~ symbol? Also, the " marks should not be used in the replace data box. I only used them to make what I'd typed stand out in the text.

I'm glad you got the formatting worked out.

In relation to 42464, that is occurring because Excel is interpreting 4/4 as the date April 4 2016. To correct this, simply select the column and use Find and Replace to replace 42464 with '4/4 (the leading single quote mark is necessary to stop the autoformat).

Regards,
Noel

Just to mention; Excel seems to handle formatting (and other things) differently from version to version.
Open Office seems more consistent in how it handles some things.

Just mentioning this in case Excel 2007 is doing strange things. I have had to use 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2003 to replicate some behaviors that were reported to me as bugs before ..
/just sayin'

That's a good point, rharv. It slipped past me.

Lee, OpenOffice is free to use. If you want to download and install it, it's at

https://www.openoffice.org/

As with any of these free programs, if you decide to install, choose the 'Custom' install route just to make sure that no added and unwanted programs also get installed.

Regards,
Noel

Thanks for the notes, guys.

It's sounding more like yet another torture session with Microsoft and their strangle hold on world business. They can't even get backward compatibility to work in their own software, much less someone else's. I make my living using their crap products. I have no choice. They need to hire smart people like Dr. P!!

Thanks again.

Well, Microsoft seems to have the goal to render used time to enhance your work flow as wasted time with the next version.

Up to XP you could enter properties in files for many non-Microsoft file types and use those with the Windows Explorer search function. Many of these are no more accessible in this way since Vista. Maybe Vista was named as a shortened "Hasta la vista!".

Many functions in Excel or Access were wiped out in the course of new versions. Many databases and spreadsheets have to be re-developed because used functions are not available in the new versions.

But what do I do in a case like the one you describe above (using MS products)?

I do use Word as a receiver of the intial table.
1. Select the appropriate paper size (often you need to make it a large one).
2. Select the appropriate format (under Layout) to be landscape or portrait to fit the table in its entire width into one line.
3. Paste the data.
4. Convert text to table
5. Add a column on the far left side of the table
6. Reconvert table to text using "Tab" as a delimiter.
7. Then I can global change contents using the search string ^tmy-text-to-be-changed^t and the replace string ^tmy-changed-text^t.

Are there elements in the table in another column that might be changed but shouldn't?
Select the column you want to have the data reformatted and copy it into a new document.
Follow with step 6.
If it is a single column in the above strings the ^t should be replaced by ^p.

This is an easy way to globally adjust the data to Excel's needs. This process is like a pulley -- you need to pull more rope but weights appear to be lighter to you.
(It shouldn't be necessary, but...). After you've done that three or four times you will speed up the process.
Excel doesn't like several glyphs as the first symbol in a cell, e.g. "=", "-", ".", and some others. Excel always tries to convert calendar date like number formats into a calender date format (yy/mm or mm/dd or similar); 4/4 will be April 4th. Excel doesn't like musicians' time signatures.

Another program you could use is Access if you have it. Access treats these data different than Excel. (You could use Access as a spreadsheet and not as a database using just a single table. In this case you just need to get familiar with the process and you do not have to learn "database". But you could if you want to.)

Many thanks for chiming in GHinCH!

So, it's not just me. I used to be an advanced level Access 97 user a long time ago; just short of using VBA code instead of queries to drive forms and outputs. I use Office 2007 and can't make heads or tails of where to start in Access. It would take me weeks to figure out their new interface. Like Dr. McCoy said in Star Trek the Motion Picture, "I know engineers. They Love to change things!" For some dumb reason, too many companies love to slam us against the wall with newer technology because they can, not because it's necessary. Leave the damn stuff alone!! It worked fine!!!

Why a company would remove features and benefits so useful to the business world, is beyond me. In my profession, we try to ask users what they need most. Otherwise, we would go out of business. Some moron U.S. judge decided that Microsoft did not have a monopoly on the market. I submit he or she was wrong. I hope to live long enough to see Microsoft go out of business - having been replaced with real software written by people who care. </rant>

Thanks again...

First statement: I don't believe this to happen.
Second statement: Since they don't write in Assembler anymore I really doubt that this will be a future scenario. Today's languages cater to the unefficient programmer because they themselves do take so many tasks away that the programmer doesn't even have to be a good logician any more...

Today's computers salute the lazy software engineer: "Hey, I'm powerful enough. Don't worry about loading time of programs, my memory can hold programs as large as you want them to be. Do you have many loops and unefficient code? Eight cores in my processor handle that with ease and fast enough so that the user doesn't notice that you're a lousy programmer."

(I could go on, but still there are some magnificent software developers out there, but maybe these people avoid to be in contact with certain companies.)

Good ones, GHinCH!

"(I could go on, but still there are some magnificent software developers out there, but maybe these people avoid to be in contact with certain companies.)"

Correct. There are some magnificent developers out there. They just don't get hired by MS! I believe you said that. My IT guy thinks (and I agree) so much of the software today has been designed to automate everything. That's fine until either: 1) The product simply doesn't work, or 2) The automated bits are totally counter-intuitive to what we want.

I wish developers would stop giving me crappy stuff and other stuff I just don't want. Get rid of the My Pictures, My Videos, My Briefcase (which I think is finally gone!), and other useless folders. I'll make my own.

'Nough said. Now, where did I leave my Yamaha keyboard? Still hooked to BIAB I suspect .