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Excel cell turns black whilst entering data

Anonymous
2013-01-15T11:11:35+00:00

Hi,

There's a document that's used by some people in the office and whenever they try to enter data into it the cell turns black while they're doing it and they can't see what they've typed until they click off it. These documents are something to do with Sage and not something they've created and if they make a new sheet within them they can edit cells without issue. I'm sure it's just some setting somewhere but could someone please enlighten me as to what it might be?

Thanks

Microsoft 365 and Office | Excel | For home | Windows

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  1. Anonymous
    2013-01-15T11:22:09+00:00

    There may be some conditional formatting on this cell/sheet. Go to Condtitonal formatting Tab from Home Tab.

    Click on clear rules/Clear rules from sheet.

    If it doesn't work then try to change the fill and font color from formatting tab.

    152 people found this answer helpful.
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  2. Anonymous
    2013-01-15T14:01:36+00:00

    Thanks for the reply, I check the Conditional Formatting and there doesn't seem to be anything. I dd manage to narrow it down to the fact that it seems to be using Automatic for the background pattern colour. It seems that it's only applying this pattern when I'm editing the cell and by changing that pattern colour to white I can fix it on a cell by cell basis but this isn't a suitable fix for the whole sheet because there's hundreds of them and they create new ones each month. Where does Excel get the colour for "Automatic"? I checked to  see if there was a macro setting the colour but there isn't.

    11 people found this answer helpful.
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  3. Anonymous
    2013-01-15T14:14:56+00:00

    Hi,

    if your workbook is with extension .xlsm (macros enabled)

    then, look for a code.

    Right click on sheet tab, select View Code

    and  check if there is something like...Private Sub....

    or

    in existing window...

    take a look, on the left side

    find... ThisWorkbook

    double click on this...

    2 people found this answer helpful.
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  4. Anonymous
    2013-01-15T16:25:52+00:00

    Thanks but it's a regular xlsx. I've been talking to her a bit more and it sounds like she created the spreadsheet herself years ago and it just keeps on getting changed and changed again. I think if I can change the 'Automatic' colour then they will be able to use it just fine. I'm assuming that the problem has cascaded down to the users as they've each got some version of that original file.

    Is there some way I can edit the Excel file to just use white instead of black for the 'Automatic' colour?

    2 people found this answer helpful.
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  5. Anonymous
    2013-01-28T09:01:19+00:00

    Is there some way I can edit the Excel file to just use white instead of black for the 'Automatic' colour?

    Select entire sheet and go to format/cells and there try to change the color of font from black to white, also try to change the color of fill.

    Did you try it or there is no option to change the font/fill color while working in this file.

    24 people found this answer helpful.
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