[RESOLVED] excel 2007 paste (special, values, etc.) not available?

I'm copying text from a web page (html) to a 'text' cell in excel 2007. When I do this, the "Paste" options are mostly greyed out... i.e. 'values' although shown on the "Paste-Options" menu, is grey and not available. This SEEMS to only happen when copying the original phrase from a web page. If I copy from another cell on the spreadsheet, a .txt document, etc., this option is enabled and working as I expect.

I've already built a macro to get around the extra button clicks necessary to achieve the expected results, (the PASTE-SPECIAL-TEXT combination DOES work), so I don't need a shortcut. What I DO need is to simply understand why these options are unavailable under the specific circumstances. What am I overlooking or misunderstanding?

BTW: the reason this is an issue to begin with is that if my user just chooses "PASTE" instead of "PASTE-SPECIAL-TEXT", the font changes to Arial 8, instead of preserving the expected (and pre-formatted) cell formatting which specifies Calibri 11 font. If there is a better approach to my confusion, I'm open to suggestions. I'm assuming that the HTML tags are changing the default cell format during a regular "PASTE", where "PASTE-SPECIAL-TEXT" preserves the configuration. But, I'm not sure I'm barking up the right tree...

Does click in the block, then Ctrl-V paste into the block. Had that work at times.

if I'm understanding your response correctly, no; this doesn't work, it is the same as choosing "PASTE" and behaves as outlined originally. I'm still pretty confused about this.

The problem may lie with what you're trying to copy and paste.

I just tried it here in Excel 2007 (Office Ultimate); font currently set as Calibri 11. Back here on this page, I highlighted and copied the first sentence from your first post above. Back over in Excel, I right-clicked cell A1, selected "Paste-Special...", (with no problem), selected "Text" and clicked OK. As you would expect, the sentence is now in Excel's cell A1 using Calibri 11.

If you can post a link to the page and describe what you're trying to copy and paste, I'll give it a try here.

Hi Doc, thanks for the response... I can replicate the "success" you describe exactly as you discovered... my confusion is over 2 inter-related issues:

1) If I just "PASTE" instead of "Paste-Special, etc...", it changes the font characteristics.
2) MOST of the options that I believe SHOULD be available on the pull-down "PASTE" menu, i.e. 'VALUES', etc., are greyed out when the source data is from ANY .html document as opposed to a pre-existing Excel slot, OR plain text.

So, I'm glad you've confirmed my findings, but I'm still in the dark about the discrepancies. I can replicate these "failures" from ANY html source.

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Originally Posted by shiva_42

Hi Doc, thanks for the response...

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No problem.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by shiva_42

I can replicate the "success" you describe exactly as you discovered... my confusion is over 2 inter-related issues:

1) If I just "PASTE" instead of "Paste-Special, etc...", it changes the font characteristics.

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Yes, of course. To avoid that you could: 1) Use Paste-Special > Text (which strips the formatting), or 2) Paste it into Notepad first and then re-copy it from there, which would also strip the formatting.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by shiva_42

2) MOST of the options that I believe SHOULD be available on the pull-down "PASTE" menu, i.e. 'VALUES', etc., are greyed out when the source data is from ANY .html document as opposed to a pre-existing Excel slot, OR plain text.

So, I'm glad you've confirmed my findings, but I'm still in the dark about the discrepancies. I can replicate these "failures" from ANY html source.

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When you "right-click>Paste" the hidden formatting is also copied. When you "right-click>Paste-Special>Text" the hidden formatting is stripped out.

good info so far... any ideas or comments about why so many of the "Paste" options are unavailable when the source data is from .html???

Because Excel wasn't really intended to be a HTML editor?

well... there IS that! :rolleyes:

:)