Text box with asterisk border on top and bottom?

**leaning** · 12-13-2010, 11:48 PM

Hello!

I have a text box with a solid border, but now we are going to just an asterisks border on the top and bottom. So it should look like this:

***************
text

***************

Can this be done?

VR/Lost

**teylyn** · 12-14-2010, 06:45 AM

Why revert to ASCII style formatting in the age of GUI? Why make life more complicated than it needs to be?

**leaning** · 12-14-2010, 07:00 AM

Teylyn,

We use it for military document signature blocks like this:

****************************
JOHN J. SMITH
LCDR, USN
COMMANDING OFFICER
*****************************

I fully agree with you that the construct is archaic, but since that is what the original US government regulation (probably from the 1960's) has in it, that is what we do.

Right now, the text box I have has a single line border, but then I was "informed" that that didn't match the regulation verbatim (which has the asterisks top and bottom). IN Excel, there is an option for the border to be be dotted on all 4 sides, but not one for only 2 sides (that I can see).

So, I figured VBA to format the textbox would be the way to go.

HTH!

VR/Lost

**leaning** · 12-14-2010, 07:23 AM

Teylen.

I came up with this which works and looks OK:

In the formula bar for the text box, type:
="****************************"&CHAR(10)&"JOHN J. SMITH"&CHAR(10)&"LCDR, USN"&CHAR(10)&"COMMANDING OFFICER"&CHAR(10)&"****************************"

So, no VBA solution needed.

Thanks!

VR/Lost

**davesexcel** · 12-14-2010, 07:24 AM

Hi,
You could set up the text in the textbox with the asterisks then format the textbox borders to no color, so it will appear that the asterisks are the border

ALt +enter also gives you a new line in a cell