The Excel Team Blog : Beginner

Now where on the network did I save my workbook?

Excel Blog — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 00:00:00 GMT

If you commonly share workbooks that are saved on your network, consider adding the Document Location box to your Quick Access Toolbar. This box shows you exactly where your workbook is located. If you can see the path, you can easily paste it into an email message and send it to people. This is way better than sending around big file attachments! ...( read more ) Read More......(read more)

Two tips for faster worksheet navigation

Excel Blog — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 18:00:00 GMT

If your workbook contains a ton of worksheets, it can be a hassle to navigate to just the right sheet. For one thing, you often can't see all the sheet names at the bottom of the workbook. Sure, you can move around by using the four navigation buttons to the left of the worksheet tabs, or by pressing Ctrl + Page Up or Ctrl + Page Down, but there are faster ways to jump from sheet to sheet. ...( read more ) Read More......(read more)

Speed up data-entry tasks by using End Mode

Excel Blog — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 17:45:00 GMT

The other day, I was filling out a huge Excel table, and I found myself needing to enter the exact same information in multiple cells. To save time, I used something called End mode in combination with the arrow keys on my keyboard to quickly select all the cells I needed to change. Many of my own coworkers have never heard of End mode, so I thought you might not know about it either. It's a handy status bar option, and in my opinion it's often easier to use than fill down when you need to...(read more)

Free training: Take the next steps in growing your Excel skills

Excel Blog — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 17:15:00 GMT

In early May, we told you about the new video series Excel Skills Builder in our post " Take the first step in growing your Excel skills ." In that post, we announced the launch of lesson 1. Well, we've finally finished the rest of the lessons, and wanted to share this great resource with you! As a reminder, the skills builder is a video series that comprises short (typically under 5 minutes each) videos that give you an overview of a task or feature in Excel. The videos are grouped...(read more)

Check it out: options for using check marks in Excel

Excel Blog — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 04:50:00 GMT

Sometimes there's more than one way to get what you want - take check marks for example. Keep reading to learn about the various options for adding checkmarks to a worksheet. ...( read more ) Read More......(read more)

Learn how to create your own Excel macros in this free training course

Excel Blog — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 16:00:00 GMT

Have you been wanting to record your own Excel macros, but you're not yet ready to dip your toes in the water? Maybe you want to modify macros other people have created, or you're not sure what a macro can do for you? If so, you may want to take this online training course on creating Excel macros. ...( read more ) Read More......(read more)

Take the first step in growing your Excel skills

Microsoft Excel — Tue, 10 May 2011 18:49:00 GMT

It's hard to find time to learn new skills. We're all busy, and as much as we might want to become more proficient in something, we seldom have the extra time required to learn. That's one of the reasons I'm excited about the new video series, called the Excel skills builder. In a nut shell, the skills builder is a video series, comprised of short (typically under 5 minutes each) videos that give you an overview of a task or feature in Excel. The videos are grouped so that you can...(read more)

Learn the ins and outs of dates and formulas in this free training course

Microsoft Excel — Tue, 03 May 2011 18:03:00 GMT

Have you ever wanted to subtract one date from another? Or find out how many workdays until vacation? Or maybe you need to figure out a project end date. You can do all of this and more by using date functions in Excel formulas. As long as you type a date in a format that Excel recognizes: 8/22/2011, 22-August-2011, or August 22, 2011, for example, Excel will interpret the date as a serial number, and you can use formulas to find important dates. For example, you can then use formulas to subtract...(read more)

Excel Table or PivotTable?

Microsoft Excel — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 18:00:00 GMT

In Excel there are tables and PivotTables. You may wonder why you'd need to create a table when the whole worksheet already looks like one. And you've heard about PivotTables and how complex they are. To be able to use either effectively, it helps to know what each of them does, and when to use one or the other. Continue reading to learn more about the differences between tables and PivotTables. ...( read more ) Read More......(read more)

Repair numbers formatted as text

Microsoft Excel — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 23:00:00 GMT

Today's blog post on repairing numbers that are formatted as text is brought to you by Gary Willoughby, who writes Help content for Microsoft Excel. A few months ago, my new manager e-mailed us (that is, her team of Excel writers). She had a spreadsheet with some columns of numbers that she wanted to total, and the answer was resolving to 0. When you have lots of values in a column and their total is 0, you have a problem: Those numbers may not be numbers at all ! (cue the scary music). Keep...(read more)

Give Excel tables a try

Microsoft Excel — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 22:20:00 GMT

Okay, you’ve got data arranged in spreadsheet rows and columns, with column headers. So why try tables? Well, tables make it easy to format data, sort, filter, add totals, and use formulas. With tables, you don’t need to fuss to get formatting just right. Excel automatically adds formatting that makes tables stand out from any other data on your spreadsheet. And if you don’t like the formatting you see at first, Excel has many table formats to select from. Tables automatically come...(read more)

Can’t find the Chart Wizard? No worries

Microsoft Excel — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 22:11:00 GMT

Going, going, gone! Yes, it’s true that the Chart Wizard was removed from the product when we shipped Excel 2007, and we didn’t bring it back in Excel 2010. For those of you upgrading from Excel 97-2003, this may come as a big shock. The Chart Wizard provided a useful four-step process that you could simply follow to create a chart with a finishing touch. Unfortunately, it didn’t make sense to update the Chart Wizard to incorporate the many changes that were made when the chart...(read more)

Switching to Excel 2010? Start here…

Microsoft Excel 2010 — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 02:52:52 GMT

There are lots of great reasons to step up to Excel 2010 from an earlier version. Some of the new features— sparklines , slicers , PowerPivot —were enough for me to take the plunge personally. If you’ve recently upgraded to Excel 2010, or are just about to do so, I want you to know that we have resources available that can help you through the transition. If you’re upgrading from Excel 2007, it won’t take you long to figure out Excel 2010. For the highlights, I’d recommend scanning the What’s New...(read more)

Sparklines: tiny charts show the big picture

Microsoft Excel 2010 — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 22:00:09 GMT

Today’s blog post is brought to you by Judi Hurlock, who writes Excel online training for Office.com. I write free training courses for Office.com. My job is to learn new features, and the tried and true, and to pass that learning on to you. Recently I heard about a new feature in Excel 2010 called sparklines. I couldn’t tell just by the name what the feature was. But when I found out that a sparkline is a tiny chart, the proverbial light bulb turned on, and I realized this was something...(read more)

Create a bulleted list in a cell

Microsoft Excel 2010 — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 02:07:06 GMT

Today’s blog post is brought to you by Gary Willoughby. Gary is a writer on Office.com who has created and edited content about Excel, Access, and Project. For those of you who like bulleted lists and are frustrated that you can’t insert one in a cell, there is a way to insert bullet points in a cell to emulate such a thing. Just keep in mind that this isn’t a true list, so you can’t generate more bulleted lines by inserting a new line – you have to insert a bullet character on each line. That said...(read more)