URGENT: Numbers as Text...Formatting NIGHTMARE!

Hi All,

I work for a commercial print firm and i'm undertaking a job at the moment where we print 11 items on a large sheet of paper, all numbered individually using the DataMerge function within a piece of software called Adobe InDesign which links to a .CSV File. It is CRITICAL that the numbers appear in the format 0000 i.e. 1 would be 0001, 299 would be 0299 etc.

Each sheet has 11 numbering positions, so my spreadsheet has 11 columns, and then if I need 25 Sheets in total I have 25 rows, if I need 100 sheets then 100 rows etc.

At the moment, the process I am following is:

1. Use Formulas to Add/Subtract Numbers to adjacent cells to facilitate the automatic continuation of the number sequence down each column, back to the top of the next and down that column and so on
2. Copy and Paste data to matching tab where is pasted as Text
3. Save Spreadsheet as a .CSV File
4. Link .CSV file to the Adobe InDesign file using the DataMerge function
5. Save as a PDF from InDesign which gives me the resulting number of sheets, all numbered in 11 positions.

Now...this is where it goes wrong. Somewhere in the process whether it be in the formula, the copying and pasting or the saving as a .CSV File the leading zeros are all being stripped away.

Could someone have a look at the attached for me, and either suggest some actions, or download it and make the changes and re-upload for me? I can't get my head around it!

Just to help, I have labeled the Tab in my spreadsheet with the formulas as 'INPUT TAB' and the tab where I need the text results to be as 'TEXT'.

Any queries, do please ask!

Appreciate the help in advance!



Chris

Nevermind, MrShorty addressed the "do not open csv in Excel" part. Ignore me.