How do I save a CSV file without losing leading or trailing zeros?

Administrative Updates for Documents

When performing administrative updates on Documents, Grand Avenue uses the Document Number and Revision values specified in a CSV file to search for the Document(s) to be updated. When the system finds no documents that exactly match the search criteria, the system displays the error message “No such Document exists.”

Importing Documents

Similarly, when importing documents using a CSV file, the resulting Document Number and/or Revision fields in Grand Avenue may not include leading or trailing zeros entered in the CSV import file.

Leading and Trailing Zeros in Numerical Fields

Leading zeros before a decimal point (e.g. 001) and/or trailing zeros after a decimal point (e.g. 1.0) in fields that contain only numbers are a common cause of issues when importing Documents and making administrative updates for Documents. When a CSV file is closed and reopened, Excel reverts numerical fields to the default Number formatting and, consequently, removes leading and trailing zeros.

Example

The two documents shown below require administrative updates, so the Document Number (with leading zeros before the decimal point) and Revision (with trailing zeros after the decimal point) values in the CSV file need to be formatted as Text before saving the file.

Open

Below are views of the same CSV file

CSV file is saved with columns formatted as text	CSV data imports with no errors

CSV file is saved with columns formatted as text	CSV data imports with no errors
Open

Instructions for Documents with fields containing leading or trailing zeros

1. Edit the CSV file.

2. If columns are formatted as number, Excel does not preserve leading or trailing zeros. To preserve leading and/or trailing zeros, format the Document Number and Revision columns as text.

    

3. Enter leading or trailing zeros as needed and save the CSV file.