:
: A few questions / reactions: I believe that the
: table will only have its full value with full serial numbers. In
: my experience, spreadsheets and databases do not work well with
: the XXX characters,

I have developed a spreadsheet that handles this, and puts an XXX in the proper sequence if its real number is known.

:There
: are also issues of confidentiality. I have some serial numbers
: in my spreadsheet that have been submitted, on the condition
: that they be maintained as confidential. It will be important
: for us to agree on the fields of data being presented in the
: database.

My spreadsheet handles this too.

What I have done is split storage and public presentation, this example uses Peter's data but modified to present more cases -- Do not use for navigation!

First picture is the raw data sheet.

Here is a blow-up of part of it:

The Serial is split across three columns, prefix, real suffix and display suffix. Reference has been similarly split to improve sort by Reference, and Owner has been split into real and display also.
Here is the Display sheet still in the order of entry of the watches:

Now we sort the raw data using only the columns A and B:

And here's the result:

In more detail:

If anyone can thing of improvements or would a copy of the spreadsheet just email me.

One caveat, I do not have a copy of MS-Excel to try this with, but all the functions I've used are documented as "Excel compatible"

Mike