Conditional Formatting Rules Not Working

I made a slight mistake when I sent this. As I said before I found what I believe is a slight glitch in the Conditional formatting where it comes to using a "formula" to compare with. Here are the steps to get it to work when it simply won't take your entries.

1. Make the cell for the conditional formatting the "active" cell.

2. Click the conditional formatting button.

3. Click the "Add Rule" button.

4. Select the "Less than or equal to" under the 123 selections.

5. Now here is where it gets a little tricky. If you have a cell value that you are going to use for the comparison, enter the literal value of that cell. Do not reference the cell with the formula just yet.

6. Click the Done button. Numbers accepts this.

7. Click the "Show Highlighting rules" button.

8. Go to the field where you placed the literal value and this time, reference the actual cell.

9. Click the green checkmark.

10. Now, press the "Done" button.

At this point the conditional highlighting should work. I have tried this several times and it has not failed to work yet. I hope this works for you. Please give me feedback and please ignore my last message. Thanks!

I found something that may really help. I was having trouble getting conditional formatting to work when I used the number to compare to a cell with a formula in it. It would beep at me but not tell me what was wrong. I tried everything I knew until, I decided to set up a bogus rule using text (selecting abc) and is and put text in the solution. Then I modified that rule to do what I wanted in the first place which was 123 and "greater than" and referenced the formula cell. From then on, it worked without a hitch. I could go on and add a couple more rules. I hope this is not confusing and actually helps. I believe there is a slight glitch in the software, but that is my opinion. Numbers is absolutely great!

When something doesn't work, I think outside the box. It has worked for me sense then.

I have just experienced the exact same situation. Very simple Condition instead of True/False with Green/Red I am using Credit/Debit filling cell Green/Red and Bold text. I see no replies to this inquiry...the sheet was working perfectly and suddenly when i made a simple change from Credit to Debit there is no fill or text format applied event though the Conditional Highlighting is correctly sent (as your example illustrates).

Perhaps sharing the problem document will help us help you. I can not replicate the problem by just setting up cells with conditional formatting based on the "TRUE" and "FALSE"

Hi mg_ffg,

Your rules look good. What do the cells look like could there be invisible characters or spaces?

quinn

I've tried to eliminate the potential of extraneous characters by changing the Conditional Highlight criteria from "Text Is" to "Text Contains"...generalizing the criteria in an attempt to eliminate the idea that there may be unseen characters...yet still the Conditional Highlight does is not working - as it has for 9+ months.

Hi Mick,

You could try trashing the rules altogether and then redoing them after a save and quit. It may come down to sharing the actual document or cuttinga nd pasting tables to a new one. With the limited info we have and being unable to duplicate the issue there is not much advice we can give.

quinn

test conditional formatting on a NEW document and see if it works. It may be that your document is corrupt

Greetings and Thank You.

Good points and suggestions by all.

Ironically, when i started-up my Mac today and opened the specific Numbers sheet the Highlighting Conditions all function as expected.

Interestingly, the Cells that had lost their formatting - and still included the conditional "Text" entry - retained their Conditional Highlight format rules sans application to the Cell. Re-entering the "Text" string - by simply (re-)typing the "Text" entry - caused the Conditional Highlight rules to be applied. I had tried this before without success and in fact when i (re-)typed the entry in to Cells that were properly formatted with the Highlight rules the Cell lost its formatting but retained the Conditional Highlight rules....odd

I wish i could point to a specific 'solution'...however i was not able to identify a cause<>effect. It seems that the action of either:

1. Quitting the Numbers Application; or,
2. Restarting the Mac

Fixed the problem. Cannot confirm however.

Thank you again.