Hi Bill - Glad the formula worked. Need some more information before I can help with the 2nd question:
1) How are you creating the new row? Is it using the action framework create new row and then uses default values, is it a model that has “create new if none” enabled where the new row is created on page load?
2) Is the field that you are trying to put the result in to a UI-Only field or a SFDC SObject field?
3) What is the datatype of the field that you are trying to put the new value in to?
