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Cannot undo circular formula error

Anonymous
2018-07-15T20:05:57+00:00

I have a spreadsheet with a circular formula reference (I know, circular refs are nasty, but it's for a client that does some pretty heady accounting stuff and they insist it is necessary to do things this way). They have Auto-Calculate and Iterative calculations enabled. Auto-save is turned OFF.

The problem is that occasionally, they edit one of their valid circular formulas and by mistake, usually because of a simple typo, "break" the circular reference chain, resulting in a bunch of #NAME? errors scattered throughout the spreadsheet on the cells that are part of the references. 

You'd think, "Ok, no problem..Just hit Undo" and voila, you'd expect Excel to undo the typo in the formula, and bring things would be back to the way they were, but that's not the case. Excel's 2016 undo does not seem to be able to cope with this situation. 

My client contends that going back prior to 10+ years ago, this was always a problem, but that it was fixed in more recent years, but that now, suddenly, it is broken again since I upgraded her copy of Excel to the latest Targeted release. I, however, am pretty convinced that this has *never* worked and this scenario is in fact not undoable - I'd go so far as to say that it's a bug. I've now tested it on every version of Excel 2016 going back to the initial release and it doesn't work on any of them. Does anyone know otherwise?

Bob

Microsoft 365 Insider | Excel | Windows

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  1. Anonymous
    2018-07-16T17:02:39+00:00

    Thanks for the provided information. I will pass this report along to the Excel team. You can also report this, and have your client do so as well, but going to File > Feedback and using the send-a-smile/send-a-frown buttons.

    -Jesse

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  2. Anonymous
    2018-07-16T10:44:24+00:00

    I've replied via private message as requested. Thanks.

    Bob

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  3. Anonymous
    2018-07-16T02:12:41+00:00

    Hi Bob,

    Thanks for the query.

    We would like to do some testing in the same environment. To do that, could you please share with us the below information?

    1. Please share with us a sample workbook with sample circular formula reference via theprivate messageI just sent to you.
    2. Some related steps and screenshots about how you "break the circular reference chain" with typo.
    3. Your exact Office version (File > Account > Product Information). Please provide a screenshot of the entire information under Product Information with subscription, version build and channel information.

    Please mask your email address to protect your privacy.

    Thanks,

    Tina

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