Dates on spreadsheet showing incorrectly when previewed

[Val M]

I am sharing a spreadsheet prepared in Office Libre with some colleagues. When viewed on the Web dates prior to 1900 are replaced by ******* The dates do show correctly if the sheet is downloaded.

[Hannah]

Hey @Val M, thanks for bringing this to our attention.

Can you send us a couple of screenshots of an example file for comparison?

Thanks in advance!

[Val M]

I have made a sample if you go to 

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/wsarz6oijfqna25cn7viu/Sample-Doc.ods?dl=0&rlkey=evbzog7fc93spvlk65bo2...

you can see it.  Sorry, they are hashtags, not asterisks.   If you download it, it will show correctly.

Thanks,

Val

[Rich]

---

@Val M wrote:

I am sharing a spreadsheet ... When viewed on the Web dates prior to 1900 are replaced by ******* The dates do show correctly if the sheet is downloaded.

---

A spreadsheet, whether it's Excel, LibreOffice, etc., typically displays ######## when the content of a cell is wider than the column. The screenshot below shows a preview of an Excel file with dates for 2023 in two columns (same dates in both columns), with the second column widened in Excel to show the full content of the cell. The first column isn't wide enough so the content is replaced with ########.

Since the column width of the preview page is fixed, there's no way to widen the column to show the full content of those cells. In this case, you'll need to widen the cell in LibreOffice before saving, or download the file and open it in LibreOffice to see the full content.

[Val M]

That was the first thing I thought of but most of the data is in the form dd mm yyyy and when the year is > 1899 it displays.  When the year is earlier than 1900 it doesn't display.  it is not a width problem.   For instance, 16 May 1828 has the same number of characters as 14 Jun 1916.   The first is not shown, the second is.

[Walter]

Hey @Val M, sorry to jump in, but are you still having issues with this?

If so, have you tried what Rich suggested perhaps?