Unwelcome color changes

[banyan]

Any clues what went wrong here?

I've been using a spreadsheet for about 2 years. It gets used almost
everyday. Over time I've created perhaps 6 or 8 custom colors in the
color palette. The sheet is all numbers and I have used color
extensively to highlight various cells.

Yesterday for the first time I created a new window while using this
spreadsheet and had different workbook pages open in each one. I
updated data in only one window. After a while I saved the file and
exited, then backed it up.

Today when I opened it I found these problems with the colors. First,
all my custom colors were gone. Second, some cells, but not all, were
set to black background (pattern) and black characters, rendering great
sections of the sheet unuseable. Also, no matter how I tried to open
it Excel always opened it with both the windows I was using yesterday
visible by default.

The only way I've found around the color problem was to go to each page
and set all cells to black characters on white background. This still
left some cells completely black and unreadable. I then had to goto
Options:Colors and modify the color Black to a light grey in order to
see what was in the blackened cells.

I've been using spreadsheets since Visicalc and Supercalc, and Excel
since the very first version, and have never seen this behaviour
before. Can anyone tell me what happened and why? And is there a way
to retrieve my backup version of the workbook file and restore the
proper colors?

thanks, banyan

[Debra Dalgleish]

I've seen this happen when using multiple windows, but can't remember
the exact sequence of events that might have caused it.

If you have an old version of the workbook with the correct colour
scheme, you can try to import that scheme into your backup copy. (Make
another copy of it first!)

Open the workbook with incorrect colours, and the one with correct colours.
Activate the workbook with incorrect colours
Choose Tools>Options
On the Color tab, from the Copy Colors From dropdown, choose the
workbook with correct colours, and click OK.


banyan wrote:
> Any clues what went wrong here?
>
> I've been using a spreadsheet for about 2 years. It gets used almost
> everyday. Over time I've created perhaps 6 or 8 custom colors in the
> color palette. The sheet is all numbers and I have used color
> extensively to highlight various cells.
>
> Yesterday for the first time I created a new window while using this
> spreadsheet and had different workbook pages open in each one. I
> updated data in only one window. After a while I saved the file and
> exited, then backed it up.
>
> Today when I opened it I found these problems with the colors. First,
> all my custom colors were gone. Second, some cells, but not all, were
> set to black background (pattern) and black characters, rendering great
> sections of the sheet unuseable. Also, no matter how I tried to open
> it Excel always opened it with both the windows I was using yesterday
> visible by default.
>
> The only way I've found around the color problem was to go to each page
> and set all cells to black characters on white background. This still
> left some cells completely black and unreadable. I then had to goto
> Options:Colors and modify the color Black to a light grey in order to
> see what was in the blackened cells.
>
> I've been using spreadsheets since Visicalc and Supercalc, and Excel
> since the very first version, and have never seen this behaviour
> before. Can anyone tell me what happened and why? And is there a way
> to retrieve my backup version of the workbook file and restore the
> proper colors?
>
> thanks, banyan
>


--
Debra Dalgleish
Contextures
http://www.contextures.com/tiptech.html

[banyan]

Yes, I suppose that is the only thing left to do. Fortunately, I have
about a ten layer back up sequence so I'll start going through them
until I find one uncorrupted. And, no more multiple windows!

tks, jim

Debra Dalgleish wrote:
> I've seen this happen when using multiple windows, but can't remember
> the exact sequence of events that might have caused it.
>
> If you have an old version of the workbook with the correct colour
> scheme, you can try to import that scheme into your backup copy. (Make
> another copy of it first!)
>
>
> Debra Dalgleish
> Contextures
> http://www.contextures.com/tiptech.html

[banyan]

Fortunately I was able to restore a version of the file which I had
uploaded to my domain's host machine. I, from now on, will keep a copy
of my color pallette in a separate file in a separate folder, just in
case . . .

tks, again

banyan wrote:
> Yes, I suppose that is the only thing left to do. Fortunately, I have
> about a ten layer back up sequence so I'll start going through them
> until I find one uncorrupted. And, no more multiple windows!
>
> tks, jim
>
> Debra Dalgleish wrote:
> > I've seen this happen when using multiple windows, but can't remember
> > the exact sequence of events that might have caused it.
> >
> > If you have an old version of the workbook with the correct colour
> > scheme, you can try to import that scheme into your backup copy. (Make
> > another copy of it first!)
> >
> >
> > Debra Dalgleish
> > Contextures
> > http://www.contextures.com/tiptech.html

[Debra Dalgleish]

Good idea! Glad you were able to fix the file.

banyan wrote:
> Fortunately I was able to restore a version of the file which I had
> uploaded to my domain's host machine. I, from now on, will keep a copy
> of my color pallette in a separate file in a separate folder, just in
> case . . .
>
> tks, again
>
> banyan wrote:
>
>>Yes, I suppose that is the only thing left to do. Fortunately, I have
>>about a ten layer back up sequence so I'll start going through them
>>until I find one uncorrupted. And, no more multiple windows!
>>
>>tks, jim
>>
>>Debra Dalgleish wrote:
>>
>>>I've seen this happen when using multiple windows, but can't remember
>>>the exact sequence of events that might have caused it.
>>>
>>>If you have an old version of the workbook with the correct colour
>>>scheme, you can try to import that scheme into your backup copy. (Make
>>>another copy of it first!)
>>>
>>>
>>>Debra Dalgleish
>>>Contextures
>>>http://www.contextures.com/tiptech.html
>>
>


--
Debra Dalgleish
Contextures
http://www.contextures.com/tiptech.html