Works 2000: Pasted Cells Contain Unexpected Values

When you paste cells from one spreadsheet into another in Microsoft Works 2000, you may experience the following symptoms:

• The Paste Special command on the Edit menu may be unavailable.
• The cells into which you paste are blank, contain zeros, or contain unexpected values.

This behavior can occur if the following conditions are true:

• The cells that you copy contain at least one formula or function.
• The copied formula or function refers to a cell or cells outside of the copied range of cells.
• The cell or cells that are referred to by the copied formula or function are located in the same spreadsheet as the copied range of cells.
• You paste the copied range of cells into a range of cells in a different spreadsheet.

To work around this issue:

1. Open the spreadsheet from which you want to copy a cell or cells.
2. Click and drag to select the cell or cells that you want to copy.
3. On the Edit menu, click Copy.
4. In the same spreadsheet, click and drag to select a blank cell or a range of blank cells that match the number of rows and columns that you copied in step 3.
5. On the Edit menu, click Paste Special to paste the cells as values only.
6. On the Edit menu, click Copy.
7. Open the spreadsheet into which you want to paste the copied values.
8. Click and drag to select the cell or range of cells in which you want to paste the values.
   
   NOTE: The number of rows and columns that you select must match the number of rows and columns of the cell or range of cells that you copied.
9. On the Edit menu, click Paste.

The functionality of the Copy and Paste commands in Works 2000 is slightly different than in previous versions of Works. In previous versions, you were able to copy the values (results) of formulas in cells from one spreadsheet to another, but not the formulas.

In Works 2000, the Copy command copies the formula itself, not the value. If you copy a cell that contains a formula that refers to at least one cell that is not included in the range of copied cells, the Paste command pastes the formula, and the value or result of that pasted formula may be a blank cell or an unexpected value.

NOTE: Microsoft Works 6 does not copy the formula even if you first paste the formula into the spreadsheet that you are working on.