At 09:43 AM 23/10/2007, you wrote:

>If ZipCode refers to what I believe it does, then using an integer
>type field would be far more appropriate.

It's probably software for the US market, where they have a two-part zipcode. Someone told me the second part resolves to a set of geo coordinates.

My guess is that the person who designed the spreadsheet used reals to impose a levelled ordering. A lot of people think databases work like desktop calculators so the mistake is at least forgiveable if it was made by an accountant. As Richard noted, Excel (at least, the Jet db engine beneath it) thinks it's a calculator and doesn't allow a distinction between reals and integers. It *is* one of the many traps from using Excel as a database design tool....

./heLen