counting or limiting characters

Hi,

Is there a way to do one of the following:

a) limit the amount of characters that a cell can contain

or, if not:

b) have a column that counts the number of characters in the cell to the
left of it.

Thanks.

one way:

Data/Validation/Allow set maximum Text Length


In article <#VpE8vTOFHA.3788@tk2msftngp13.phx.gbl>,
"Glenn" <nospam@yahoo.com> wrote:

> Is there a way to do one of the following:
>
> a) limit the amount of characters that a cell can contain

If text in column B, one way:

A1: =LEN(B1)

or

A1: =IF(B1="","",LEN(B1))

Copy down as far as necessary

In article <#VpE8vTOFHA.3788@tk2msftngp13.phx.gbl>,
"Glenn" <nospam@yahoo.com> wrote:

> or, if not:
>
> b) have a column that counts the number of characters in the cell to the
> left of it.

Select the cell you want to limit then use Data | Validation where you can then specify that the cell can only contain text between certain lengths. This will have the possible disadvantage that you will prevent non-text entries in that cell.