Tablora · Library
Keep identifiers longer than 15 digits
IDs longer than 15 digits, such as 12345678901234567890, lose final digits as spreadsheet numbers. Keep them as text from the first export.
Why the last digits change
Card references, shipment tracking codes, bank transaction IDs and some account numbers run to 16, 18 or 20 digits. Spreadsheets store numbers with about 15 significant digits, so when a long code is read as a number, the digits beyond that are replaced by zeros or the value is shown in scientific notation. The change is silent and permanent: formatting the cell as text afterwards does not bring the lost digits back.
A long identifier is a label, not a quantity. The safe path is to keep it as text from the moment it leaves the source.
Keeping the full code
- Put the rows holding the long codes into Table text, then select the Delimiter that separates their fields.
- Press Calculate and compare every digit of a few identifiers in the preview with the source.
- Do not send the identifier column through the numeric normalizer; it is not an amount.
- Use Download (XLSX) and open tablora-table.xlsx, where each identifier is a text cell.
- In the receiving spreadsheet, check the cell's full value in the formula bar, not only the displayed width.
- If the identifiers sit next to amounts, keep both in the same text-safe export and convert only the amount column in your spreadsheet afterwards.
The 20-digit example
The page example has one column named id with the value 12345678901234567890. In the text-safe workbook the expected cell text is 12345678901234567890, all twenty digits, held in a text cell; the file contains no formula and no numeric value for it.
The same value given to the numeric normalizer is not converted: any integer longer than 15 digits is kept as text and counted under Values left for review.
Twenty digits in, twenty digits out: there is no rounding step anywhere in the text-safe path.
Long codes in photographed tables
The Tablora app's XLSX export turns cells into real numbers when a column is mostly numeric, and a column that holds only long digit codes can qualify. In that case the exported cells would carry rounded numbers. For such a column, use the app's CSV export, which writes each cell exactly as it was read, or paste the cells into the text-safe converter here and download the XLSX.
Long codes are also easy to misread in a photo. Check the amber cells and compare each code with the Source · page view before you export.
Signs the damage has already happened
Codes that end in a run of zeros, or appear as 1.23457E+19, were probably converted before they reached you. Go back to the original file rather than repairing them by hand.
Original synthetic example
- Input
- id 12345678901234567890
- Expected cell text
- 12345678901234567890
- Cell storage
- Explicit text, not a formula or numeric cell