Why do the dates change in the fillable PDF?

Jeremy Oesch

Hello I am making fillable PDF and I was trying to put a birthday in them and when it loaded it came out as (Not real) 04/05/23. I have changed it in the smart sheet cells where the dates read out as April 5, 2023 but when it hits the fillable PDF it changes to just numbers. I need it to be spelled out does anyone know why it changes it? If so what can i do to fix it? I thought about making helping columns but if i did i don't know what to put in them :(

Thanks,

Jeremy

bsikes

I'm guessing it's a situation where the PDF generation uses the value of a cell, as opposed to it's display value which would have your formatting set. I think to get around it, you'd need to make another column that would convert the date to a string that's formatted as you'd like. Then use that new column in the PDF generation step.

I think this formula would work for you (Change [DateColumn] to match your sheet):

=IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 1, "January", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 2, "February", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 3, "March", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 4, "April", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 5, "May", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 6, "June", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 7, "July", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 8, "August", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 9, "September", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 10, "October", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 11, "November", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 12, "December")))))))))))) + " " + DAY([DateColumn]@row) + ", " + YEAR([DateColumn]@row)

Eric Law

Are you filling out the sheet or are you using a form? If you are collecting through a form, you can just have the user select their Month and have them input their Day and Year.

bsikes

I'm guessing it's a situation where the PDF generation uses the value of a cell, as opposed to it's display value which would have your formatting set. I think to get around it, you'd need to make another column that would convert the date to a string that's formatted as you'd like. Then use that new column in the PDF generation step.

I think this formula would work for you (Change [DateColumn] to match your sheet):

=IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 1, "January", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 2, "February", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 3, "March", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 4, "April", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 5, "May", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 6, "June", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 7, "July", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 8, "August", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 9, "September", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 10, "October", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 11, "November", IF(MONTH([DateColumn]@row) = 12, "December")))))))))))) + " " + DAY([DateColumn]@row) + ", " + YEAR([DateColumn]@row)

Jeremy Oesch

@bsikes

It works great thank you so much!

Best,

Jeremy