libreofficelibreoffice-calc

Libreoffice Calc: convert many cells with text to numbers

I have got many cells in my file whose content is of the form

'14.05

I want to mass convert these cells, which contain text, to numbers, which I can compute with. 

14.05

Is there a build-in function in Libre Office for such mass conversion, or do I need to fumble around with a macro?

Solution

  • If that apostrophe is a quote prefix rather than really cell content like so:

    enter image description here

    (note the apostrophe is only shown in formula bar but not in the cell)

    then the following will be possible:

    Select the whole column A. Then select Data - Text to columns from the menu bar:

    enter image description here

    Then click OK. Now all the content which looks like numbers will be converted to numeric.

    The above works when dot is set as the decimal separator in your Calc. If you are using different locale settings where comma ist set as decimal separator, then 14.05 will never treated as numeric. Then only 14,05 will be treated as numeric.