To Unicode

Location on ribbon: Tab DVD Addin → Group Text and Number

Command ID: btnConvertUNI

What it does

Converts Vietnamese text in the current selection to precomposed Unicode and sets the font of every converted cell to Times New Roman. This is the rescue command for legacy files — cost estimates, bills of quantities, acceptance records typed in TCVN3 (.VnTime) or VNI-Times — that open as garbled text such as C«ng t¸c bª t«ng. Once converted, the text is searchable, VLOOKUP matches it, and copying into Word or PDF no longer breaks the characters.

How to use

1. Select the cells that hold the text to convert (Ctrl-click works for several separate areas).
2. Go to tab DVD Addin → group Text and Number → click To Unicode.
3. The add-in reads each cell and detects the source encoding from the cell's current font (a font starting with .Vn means TCVN3, one starting with VNI means VNI, anything else is treated as Unicode).
4. The text is rewritten in Unicode and the cell font is switched to Times New Roman.
5. The Excel status bar reports something like Converted 128 cells to Uni (font: Times New Roman) and clears itself after about 8 seconds.

Example

A bill of quantities received from a design consultant, with the "Work description" column typed in TCVN3 using the .VnTime font. Select the column and click To Unicode:

Before (.VnTime font)	After (Unicode, Times New Roman)
C«ng t¸c bª t«ng lãt M100	Công tác bê tông lót M100
Cèt thÐp dÇm sµn D<=10	Cốt thép dầm sàn D<=10
X©y têng g¹ch èng dµy 200	Xây tường gạch ống dày 200

Only after this step can you filter, group by work item, or look the description up against a unit-price table.

Notes

• Formula cells are always skipped — only text values are converted, so your summary formulas stay intact.
• The result cannot be undone with Ctrl+Z; save the file or duplicate the sheet before running it on a large table.
• If nothing is selected as a range (for example a shape or chart is selected), the add-in shows "Please select a data range." and stops.
• Source-encoding detection relies on the cell font. If someone has already forced the whole table to Arial, the detection will guess wrong — test a few cells before running the whole sheet.
• Converted cells are forced to Times New Roman; if your document standard requires a different font, re-apply it afterwards.

Related

• To VNI — the reverse direction, for partners still working in VNI-Times.
• To TCVN3 — convert back to .VnTime for legacy archives.
• Convert encoding — dialog version with scope (selection / sheet / whole workbook) and a skip-formula option.
• Remove accents — strip diacritics once the text is Unicode, useful for file names and codes.