Excel

What is Excel?

Data Representation and Data Analysis are two important things in today’s world.
Excel provides an excellent solution for this. Excel is a Microsoft Office program which
provides spreadsheet used to record and analyze numerical data. Spread sheet as a
collection of columns and rows that form a table. Alphabetical letters are usually
assigned to columns and numbers are usually assigned to rows. The point where a
column and a row meet is called a cell.

Why Should I Learn Excel?

We all deal with numbers in one way or the other. We all have daily expenses which we
pay for from the monthly income that we earn. For one to spend wisely, they will need to
know their income vs. expenditure. Microsoft Excel comes in handy when we want to
record, analyze and store such numeric data.

Using excels:

Excel is an example of a program called a “spreadsheet.” Spreadsheets are used

to organize real world data, such as a check register or a rolodex. Data can be
numerical or alphanumeric (involving letters or numbers). The key benefit to
using a spreadsheet program is that you can make changes easily, including
correcting spelling or values, adding, deleting, formatting, and relocating data. A
spreadsheet can hold almost limitless amounts of data—a whole filing cabinet’s
worth of information can be included in a single spreadsheet. Once you create a
spreadsheet, you can effortlessly print it (as many copies as you want!), save it for
later modifications, or send it to a colleague via e-mail.

Where can I get Microsoft Excel?

There are number of ways in which you can get Microsoft Excel. You can buy it from a
hardware computer shop that also sells software. Microsoft Excel is part of the Microsoft
Office suite of programs. Alternatively, you can download it from the Microsoft website
but you will have to buy the license key.

How to open excel file?

There are multiple ways to open an excel file:

1.       Start Menu  Microsoft Office 2013  Excel 2013

2.       Open Run command (Windows + R)  type “excel”  Press OK
3.       Pin the excel icon to taskbar  Click on excel icon from taskbar
4.       Go to Desktop  Mouse Right Click  New  Microsoft Excel Worksheet

 
How Excel file looks like ?

Understanding the Ribbon

The ribbon provides shortcuts to commands in Excel. A command is an action that the
user performs. An example of a command is creating a new document, printing a
documenting, etc.

Ribbon components explained

Ribbon start button - it is used to access commands i.e. creating new documents,
saving existing work, printing, accessing the options for customizing Excel, etc.
Ribbon tabs – the tabs are used to group similar commands together. The home tab is
used for basic commands such as formatting the data to make it more presentable,
sorting and finding specific data within the spreadsheet.

Ribbon bar – the bars are used to group similar commands together. As an example,
the Alignment ribbon bar is used to group all the commands that are used to align data
together.

Understanding the worksheet (Rows and Columns, Sheets, Workbooks)

A worksheet is a collection of rows and columns. When a row and a column meet, they
form a cell. Cells are used to record data.

Rows and Columns:

1. Rows are the horizontal lines whereas columns are the vertical lines present in excel.
2. There are total 10, 48,576 rows and 16,384 columns available in excel.
3. Rows starts from 1 to 10, 48,576 whereas Columns starts from A to XFD
Cells:

1. Cell is the area of intersection of row and column.

2. Each cell has its own cell address. Like A1, B2 etc. where:
        a. Cell “A1” represents column A and row 1
        b. Cell “B2” represents column B and row 2

Workbook

A workbook is a collection of worksheets. By default, a workbook has three cells in

Excel. You can delete or add more sheets to suit your requirements.,

Sheets:

It is also called as a “Worksheet”. It is similar to a single page from a book. A sheet

contains multiple cells. There are multiple sheets available in excel. By default the
sheets are named Sheet1, Sheet2 and so on and so forth. We can also change the
names of these sheets of our own choices.

Customization Microsoft Excel Environment

, we are going to look at;

 Customization the ribbon

 Setting the colour theme
 Settings for formulas
 Proofing settings
 Save settings

Customization of ribbon

 Click on the ribbon start button

 Select options from the drop down menu. You should be able to see an Excel
Options dialog window
 Select the customize ribbon option from the left-hand side panel as shown below

 On your right-hand side, remove the check marks from the tabs that you do not
wish to see on the ribbon. For this example, we have removed Page Layout,
Review, and View tab.

 Click on the "OK" button when you are done.

Adding custom tabs to the ribbon

You can also add your own tab, give it a custom name and assign commands to it. Let's
add a tab to the ribbon with the text Guru99

1. Right click on the ribbon and select Customize the Ribbon. The dialogue window
shown above will appear
2. Click on new tab button as illustrated in the animated image below
3. Select the newly created tab
4. Click on Rename button
5. Give it a name of Guru99
6. Select the New Group (Custom) under Guru99 tab as shown in the image below
7. Click on Rename button and give it a name of My Commands
8. Let's now add commands to my ribbon bar
9. The commands are listed on the middle panel
10. Select All chart types command and click on Add button

11. Click on OK

Setting the color theme

To set the color-theme for your Excel sheet you have to go to Excel ribbon, and click on
à File à Option command. It will open a window where you have to follow the following

steps.

1. The general tab on the left-hand panel will be selected by default.

2. Look for color scheme under General options for working with Excel
3. Click on the color scheme drop-down list and select the desired color
4. Click on OK button

Settings for formulas

This option allows you to define how Excel behaves when you are working with
formulas. You can use it to set options i.e. auto complete when entering formulas,
change the cell referencing style and use numbers for both columns and rows and other
options.

If you want to activate an option, click on its check box. If you want to deactivate an
option, remove the mark from the checkbox. You can this option from the Options
dialogue window under formulas tab from the left-hand side panel

Proofing settings

This option manipulates the entered text entered into excel. It allows setting options
such as the dictionary language that should be used when checking for wrong spellings,
suggestions from the dictionary, etc. You can this option from the options dialogue
window under the proofing tab from the left-hand side panel

Save settings

This option allows you to define the default file format when saving files, enable auto
recovery in case your computer goes off before you could save your work, etc. You can
use this option from the Options dialogue window under save tab from the left-hand side
panel

Important Excel shortcuts

Ctrl + P used to open the print dialogue window

Ctrl + N creates a new workbook

Ctrl + S saves the current workbook

 Ctrl + C copy contents of current select

Ctrl + V paste data from the clipboard

SHIFT + F3 displays the function insert dialog window

SHIFT + F11 Creates a new worksheet

F2 Check formula and cell range covered

What is difference between MS Word and MS Excel?

MS Word is word processing application that is used to write documents like letters or

essays where text formatting is very essential to provide a printable document that can
be read very easily. Excel, on the other hand, is a spreadsheet application where you
can input data in tables in the pattern you choose.

Summary

 Microsoft Excel is a powerful spreadsheet program used to record, manipulate,

store numeric data and it can be customized to match your preferences
 The ribbon is used to access various commands in Excel
 The options dialogue window allows you to customize a number of items i.e. the
ribbon, formulas, proofing, save, etc.
There are different options available in excel:

Title Bar:
It gives title details of our excel file. It is divided in three parts: 
1. File Name: It shows the file name which we have given
to our excel file

2. Quick Access Toolbar: This is customizes toolbar available on the left side of the Title
Bar. The commands which we are using frequently can be added to Quick Access Toolbar
(Right click on the desired command and select Add to Quick Access Toolbar.
3. Minimize, Maximize/Restore, Close buttons: Minimize, Maximize/Restore, and Close
buttons are available in this.

Ribbon: It consists of below options:

1. Tabs
2. Groups
3. Commands
4. Launchers

Details for all the above options will be covered in subsequent blogs. Stay tuned!!!

Formula Bar: We can see the content of current cell in formula bar. Also we can
insert/view the formulae’s in this.

Name Box:

1. It shows the current cell address or name provided to tables, charts, pictures
2. We can give names to tables, charts, pictures using Name Box.
3. If we want to go in a particular cell address then just type cell address of desired
location in this Name Box and press Enter Key.

Rows and Columns:

1. Rows are the horizontal lines whereas columns are the vertical lines present in excel.
2. There are total 10, 48,576 rows and 16,384 columns available in excel.
3. Rows starts from 1 to 10, 48,576 whereas Columns starts from A to XFD

Cells:

1. Cell is the area of intersection of row and column.

2. Each cell has its own cell address. Like A1, B2 etc. where:
        a. Cell “A1” represents column A and row 1
        b. Cell “B2” represents column B and row 2

Scrollbars: We can scroll up-down or left-right by using Scrollbars. Vertical scrollbar is

used to scroll up-down whereas horizontal scrollbar is used to scroll left-right.

Sheets: It is also called as a “Worksheet”. It is similar to a single page from a book. A

sheet contains multiple cells. There are multiple sheets available in excel. Default names
of sheets are ‘Sheet 1’, ‘Sheet 2’, ‘Sheet 3’ etc. We can also change the names of these
sheets of our own choices.

 
How to save excel file?

When we finish working with excel file, we have to save the file or else all the data
stored in the file will get vanish. I recommend to save the file very frequently when you
are working with excel file.

There are 02 options available to save the file:

1. Save (File -->Save): It helps to save the current file on which we are working with same
file name.

2. Save As (File --> Save AS): It provides an option to save the current file on which we
are working with different file name. For example if we want to create a copy of a excel
file with different file name then we can use “Save As” option.
How to close excel file?

Once we finish our work and save the excel file, the next step is how we can close this
file.

Just click on the “X” button which is available on the top right corner of the excel file
(extreme right side on the Title Bar) to close it.

This was just an introductory part of excel. If are more interested to play with excel then
stay tuned for subsequent blogs!!!