now that you've found a way to do it it doesn't work the way i thought hoped it would i hoped we code code it as yyyy mm dd and that it would allow sorting on the column but would appear the way a user's preferences were set up in my case mmmm dd yyyy however since dr who didn't but the brackets in it won't translate to those preferences furthermore if the brackets were put in then it would still sort alphabetically by what the preferences dictate which again looks lousy therefore i suggest that we i e you dr who who knows how to do it relatively quickly restore the old style of date formats markles