Using numbers in Header

[MattKW]

I want to use numbers as a Header when Inserting a Table.

Before starting the basic sheet, I turned off "Enable Autocomplete" in "Advanced options\Editing options".

The numbers in horizontal order were: 5, 2, 15, 15, 1, 2, 6, 1, 3, 40.

When I Inserted a Table, I "checked" to make these numbers the Header Row.

They immediately changed to: 5, 2, 15, 152, 1, 23, 6, 14, 3, 40 (my bold).

There seems to be a little pattern here in that the extra digits are 2, 3, 4, but why?

The only way to trick it out of this was to place a " either before or after the number, and then disguise the " by making it the same colour as the cell.

Does Excel not like simple numbers as Headers? Was there another way to avoid this issue?

Many thanks.

[sandy666]

Excel Table (Ctrl+T) cannot use the same headers, each number in a header become as text
you can try with named range

[AliGW]

Welcome to the forum.

Does Excel not like simple numbers as Headers? Was there another way to avoid this issue?

Esentially, an Excel table is a small flatfile database. In a database, no two fields (i.e. columns) can have the same name - they need to be unique. The only way you can avoid this is not to use tables.

[TMS]

Interesting that it does that. Basically, in a Structured Table, the headings must be unique. I guess that is so the Structured Table References work. If they were alphabetic or alphanumeric and you tried to repeat them, you would get a counter added. Looks like it maintains a counter for all the numeric values. I would have expected, for example, the second 2 to become 22. But there you go, what do I know? Not something I’d ever tried.

In answer to your question, no, I don't think there is a way to avoid this. Be careful with your disguises as you might have problems if you do use Structured Table references.