I Sunk Your Cell Format!

I came across this for the first time today — A spreadsheet where the columns and rows were both numbers, rather than the normal lettered columns and numbered rows:

At first I thought, somebody must really like Battleship! 

But then I remembered Battleship is actually played with lettered rows and numbered columns, like in normal Excel but backwards. Anyway…  

Turns out this was a pretty easy fix. The accidental new format is called R1C1 format (for Row 1, Column 1), and there is a way to turn this on and off in the main Options menu:

So basically, no sweat… don’t let it sink your day!

Incidentally….

I found a great article from a British financial modelling consultancy on the pros and cons of using R1C1 cell format. Certainly worth a read, and even check out the rest of their blog.

And for the rest of us…  of course there is a Battleship game for Excel!