Section 40. Create a New Spreadsheet

40. Create a New Spreadsheet

BEFORE YOU BEGIN

38 About Sheets and Spreadsheets

SEE ALSO

41 Open an Existing Spreadsheet

42 Enter Simple Data into a Spreadsheet

Calc offers two ways to create new spreadsheets: You can create a completely blank, new spreadsheet (if you choose this approach, you must decide what to put in the spreadsheet and where that information should go), or you can use a spreadsheet template to open a preformatted spreadsheet. 16 About Styles and Templates explains what templates are.

NOTE

Unlike Writer, Wizards offer no help for creating spreadsheets.

TIP

A quick way to start OpenOffice.org is to use the QuickStarter icon on the taskbar. Right-click this icon; from the context menu, choose any OpenOffice.org program to launch it, use a template, or load an existing document. The QuickStarter icon is available only if the Load OpenOffice.org during system startup option is enabled. To enable this option, select the Memory category in the OpenOffice.org options list in the Options dialog box of any OpenOffice.org program.

40. Create a New Spreadsheet

Although Calc does not come with templates when you first install OpenOffice.org, you can easily create a template to reuse later. This task shows you how to open a blank spreadsheet. 18 Use a Template explains how to create a new spreadsheet based on a template you may have created and saved previously.

1.	Request a New Spreadsheet Select Spreadsheet from the File, New menu option. Calc creates a blank spreadsheet. Alternatively, click the New toolbar button to open a new blank Calc spreadsheet quickly.
2.	Compose Your Spreadsheet Create your spreadsheet in the blank work area of cells that Calc gives you. You'll enter text, numbers , and formulas, depending on the needs of your spreadsheet. You can print your spreadsheet (see 46 Print a Spreadsheet ) at any time.
3.	Save the Spreadsheet After creating your spreadsheet, select File, Save As and type the name of your spreadsheet. Calc uses the filename extension .ods for your spreadsheet. You can select another file format, such as Microsoft Excel; doing so saves the spreadsheet with the .xls Excel extension. Other file formats include StarCalc ( .sdc ), Text CSV ( .csv ), and HTML ( .html ).

NOTE

Although you can also use the File, Save command to save a new file for the first time, it's a good idea to use the Save As command. If you have already saved a file, using Save does not open the Save As dialog box but instead automatically saves any changes to the existing filea problem if you were planning to save the file with a new name so that you could preserve the original file.