Data and Computing Skills

Week 1.1.
Introducing Excel
Understanding What Excel Is Used For
Excel is the world’s most widely used spreadsheet software and is part of the Microsoft
Office suite. Other spreadsheet software is available, but Excel is by far the most popular
and has been the world standard for many years.
Much of the appeal of Excel is its versatility. Excel’s forte, of course, is performing
numerical calculations, but Excel is also useful for non-numeric applications. Here are
just a few uses for Excel:
 Crunching numbers Create budgets, tabulate expenses, analyze survey results, and
perform just about any type of financial analysis you can think of.
 Creating charts Create a variety of highly customizable charts.
 Organizing lists Use the row-and-column layout to store lists efficiently.
 Manipulating text Clean up and standardize text-based data.
 Accessing other data Import data from a variety of sources such as databases, text
files, web pages, and many others.
 Creating graphical dashboards Summarize a large amount of business
information in a concise format.
 Creating graphics and diagrams Use shapes and illustrations to create
professional- looking diagrams.
 Automating complex tasks Perform a tedious task with a single mouse click with
Excel’s macro capabilities.

Understanding Workbooks and Worksheets

An Excel file is called a workbook. You can have as many workbooks open as needed, and each
one appears in its window. By default, Excel workbooks use an .xlsx file extension.

The tabs in a workbook are called worksheets. Each workbook contains one or more
worksheets, and each worksheet consists of individual cells. Each cell can contain a number, a
formula, or text. A worksheet also has an invisible drawing layer, which holds charts, images,
and diagrams. Objects on the drawing layer sit over the top of the cells, but they are not in the
cells like a number or formula. You switch to a different worksheet by clicking its tab at the
bottom of the workbook window. In addition, a workbook can store chart sheets: a chart sheet
displays a single chart and is accessible by clicking a tab.

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Don’t be intimidated by all the different elements that appear within Excel’s window. You don’t
need to know what all of them mean to use Excel effectively. And after you become familiar with
the various parts, it all starts to make sense and you’ll feel right at home.
Figure 1 shows you the more important bits and pieces of Excel. As you look at the figure,
refer to Table 1 for a brief explanation of the items shown.

FIGURE 1. The Excel screen has many useful elements that you will use often.

TABLE 1. Parts of the Excel Screen That You Need to Know

Name Description
Collapse the Ribbon Click this button to hide the Ribbon temporarily. Double-click any Ribbon
button tab to make the Ribbon remain visible. Ctrl+F1 is the shortcut key that
does the same task

Column letters Letters range from A to XFD—one for each of the 16,384 columns in the
worksheet. You can click a column heading to select an entire column or
Click between the column letters and drag to change the column width.

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File button Click this button to open the Backstage view, which contains many options for
working with your document (including printing) and setting Excel options.
Formula bar When you enter information or formulas into a cell, it appears in this bar.
Horizontal scrollbar Use this tool to scroll the sheet horizontally.
Macro recorder Click to start recording a Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) macro. The icon
indicator changes while your actions are being recorded. Click again to stop recording.
Name box This box displays the active cell address or the name of the selected cell, range, or
object.
New sheet button Add a new worksheet by clicking the New sheet button (which is displayed after
the last sheet tab).
Page view buttons Click these buttons to change the way the worksheet is displayed.
Quick Access Toolbar This customizable toolbar holds commonly used commands. The Quick Access
Toolbar is always visible, regardless of which tab is selected.
Ribbon This is the main location for Excel commands. Clicking an item in the tab list
changes the Ribbon that is displayed.
Ribbon Display A drop-down control that offers three options related to displaying the Ribbon.
Options
Row numbers Numbers range from 1 to 1,048,576—one for each row in the worksheet.
You can click a row number to select an entire row or click between the
row numbers and drag to change the row height.

Search box Use this control to find commands or have Excel issue a command automatically.
Alt+Q is the shortcut to access the Search box.
Selected cell indicator This dark outline indicates the currently selected cell or range of cells. (There are
17,179,869,184 cells on each worksheet.)
Sheet tabs Each of these notebook-like tabs represents a different sheet in the workbook. A
workbook can have any number of sheets, and each sheet has its name displayed
in a sheet tab.

Sheet tab controls Use these buttons to scroll the sheet tabs to display tabs that aren’t visible. You
can also right-click to get a list of sheets.
Status bar This bar displays various messages as well as summary information about
the range of cells selected. Right-click the status bar to change which messages
are displayed.

Tab list Use these commands to display a different Ribbon.

Title bar This displays the name of the program and the name of the current workbook. It
also holds the Quick Access Toolbar (on the left), the Search box, and
some control buttons that you can use to modify the window (on the right).

Vertical scrollbar Use this tool to scroll the sheet vertically.

Window controls There are three controls for minimizing the current window, maximizing or
restoring the current window, and closing the current window, which are
common to virtually all Windows applications.

Zoom control Use this to zoom your worksheet in and out.

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Moving around a Worksheet

Every worksheet consists of rows (numbered 1 through 1,048,576) and columns (labelled A
through XFD). Column labelling works like this: After column Z comes column AA, which is
followed by AB, AC, and so on. After column AZ comes BA, BB, and so on. After column ZZ is
AAA, AAB, and so on.
The intersection of a row and a column is a single cell, and each cell has a unique address made
up of its column letter and row number. For example, the address of the upper-left cell is A1.
The address of the cell at the lower right of a worksheet is XFD1048576.
At any given time, one cell is the active cell. The active cell is the cell that accepts keyboard
input, and its contents can be edited. You can identify the active cell by its darker border, as
shown in Figure 2. If more than one cell is selected, the dark border surrounds the entire
selection, and the active cell is the light-coloured cell within the border. Its address appears in
the Name box. Depending on the technique you use to navigate through a workbook, you may
or may not change the active cell when you navigate.

FIGURE 1.
The active cell is the one with the dark border—-in this case, cell C11.

The row and column headings of the active cell appear in a different colour to make it easier to
identify the row and column of the active cell.

Workbooks and worksheets

Using the Ribbon

The Ribbon is the primary way of interacting with Excel other than entering data into cells. The
words above the icons are known as tabs: the Home tab, the Insert tab, and so on. The term
Ribbon is used in two different ways: when you click a tab, you are said to be displaying a
different Ribbon and the whole structure of tabs, groups, and controls is known as the Ribbon.

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The Ribbon can be either hidden or visible. It’s your choice. To toggle the Ribbon’s visibility,
press Ctrl+F1 (or double-click a tab at the top). If the Ribbon is hidden, it temporarily appears
when you click a tab and hides itself when you click in the worksheet. The title bar has a control
named Ribbon Display Options (next to the Minimize button). Click the control and choose one
of three Ribbon options: Auto-Hide Ribbon, Show Tabs, or Show Tabs and Commands.

Ribbon tabs
The commands available on the Ribbon vary, depending upon which tab is selected. The Ribbon
is arranged into groups of related commands. Here’s a quick overview of Excel’s tabs:
 Home You’ll probably spend most of your time with the Home tab selected. This tab
contains the basic Clipboard commands, formatting commands, style commands,
commands to insert and delete rows or columns, and an assortment of worksheet editing
commands.
 Insert Select this tab when you need to insert something into a worksheet—a table, a
diagram, a chart, a symbol, and so on.
 Page Layout This tab contains commands that affect the overall appearance of your
worksheet, including some settings that deal with printing.
 Formulas Use this tab to insert a formula, name a cell or a range, access the formula
auditing tools, or control the way Excel performs calculations.
 Data Excel’s data-related commands are on this tab, including data validation and
sorting commands.
 Review This tab contains tools to check spelling, translate words, add comments, or
protect sheets.
 View The View tab contains commands that control various aspects of how a sheet is
viewed. Some commands on this tab are also available in the status bar.
 Developer This tab isn’t visible by default. It contains commands that are useful for
programmers. To display the Developer tab, choose File ➪ Options and then select
Customize Ribbon. In the Customize the Ribbon section on the right, make sure that Main
Tabs is selected in the drop-down control and place a checkmark next to Developer.
 Help This tab provides ways to get help, make suggestions, and access other aspects of
Microsoft’s community.
 Add-Ins This tab is visible only if you loaded an older workbook or add-in that
customizes the menu or toolbars. Because the old menus and toolbars were replaced by
the Ribbon, these user interface customizations appear on the Add-Ins tab.

The preceding list contains the standard Ribbon tabs. Excel may display additional Ribbon tabs
based on what’s selected or resulting from add-ins that are installed.

The appearance of the commands on the Ribbon varies, depending on the width of the Excel
window. When the Excel window is too narrow to display everything, the commands adapt;
some of them might seem to be missing, but the commands are still available. Figure 3 shows

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the Home tab of the Ribbon with all controls fully visible. Figure 4 shows the Ribbon when
Excel’s window is made narrower. Notice that some of the descriptive text is gone, but the icons
remain. Figure 5 shows the extreme case when the window is made very narrow. Most groups
display a single icon; however, if you click the icon, all the group commands are avail-able to
you.

FIGURE 3. The Home tab of the Ribbon

FIGURE 4. The Home tab when Excel’s window is made narrower

FIGURE 5. The Home tab when Excel’s window is made very narrow

Contextual tabs
In addition to the standard tabs, Excel includes contextual tabs. Whenever an object (such as a
chart, a table, or an illustration) is selected, specific tools for working with that object are made
available on the Ribbon.

Figure 6. shows the contextual tabs that appear when a chart is selected. In this case, it has two
contextual tabs: Chart Design and Format. When contextual tabs appear, you can, of course,
continue to use all the other tabs.

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FIGURE 6.
When you select an object, contextual tabs contain tools for working with that object.

Basic mathematical operations in Microsoft excel

Mathematical operations exist in Excel for all basic arithmetic.

Symbol Operation Example

+ Addition =2+3=5
- Subtraction =9-2=7
* Multiplication =6*7=42
/ Division =9/3=3
^ Exponentiation =4^2=16
() Parentheses =(2+4)/3=2

When you want to perform various calculations in an Excel spreadsheet, you must place the
equals (=)sign prior to the formula you want to be evaluated.

Without the equals sign, a cell appears like this: 2+2

With the equals sign, Excel will perform the calculation and the result appears like this: 4

 Real Case and Exercises

Please download the Excel file name:
Basic_Mathematical_Operations_in_Microsoft_Excel.xlsx
 Then, try to complete the six different exercises provided on the
very next worksheet of the same file.

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Creating Your First Excel Workbook

This section presents an introductory, hands-on session with Excel. If you haven’t used Excel,
you may want to follow along on your computer to get a feel for how this software works.
In this example, you create a simple monthly sales projection table.

Getting started on your worksheet.

Start Excel and make sure you have an empty workbook displayed. To create a new, blank
workbook, press Ctrl+N (the shortcut key for File ➪ New ➪ Blank Workbook). Enter some sales
projections in the new workbook.

! TASK
Please download the task name: First_Worksheet_task .xlsx

Saving your workbook

Until now, everything that you’ve done has occurred in your computer’s memory. If the power
should fail, all may be lost—unless Excel’s AutoRecover feature happened to kick in. It’s time to
save your work to a file on your hard drive.
Click the Save button on the Quick Access Toolbar. (This button looks like an old- fashioned
floppy disk, popular in the previous century.) Because the workbook hasn’t been saved yet and
still has its default name, Excel responds with a Save this file dialog box that lets you choose the
location for the workbook file. The Choose a Location drop-down lists some recently used
locations, or you can click More options to see the Save as Backstage screen. From there, you can
click Browse to navigate to any location on your computer.
Click Browse. Excel displays the Save As dialog box.
In the File Name field, enter a name (such as Monthly Sales Projection). If you like, you
can specify a different location.
Click Save or press Enter. Excel saves the workbook as a file. The workbook remains open so
that you can work with it some more.

 Tip
If you have some concerns about saving, check the website below for
further information:
https://www.customguide.com/excel/how-to-save-in-excel

THE END :-)

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