1.3. Navigating in ExcelLearning how to move around the Excel grid quickly and confidently is an indispensable skill. To move from cell to cell , you have two basic choices:
As you move from cell to cell, you see the black focus box move to highlight the currently active cell. In some cases, you might want to cover ground a little quicker. You can use any of the shortcut keys listed in Table 1-1. The most useful shortcut keys include the Home key combinations, which bring you back to the beginning of a row or the top of your worksheet. Note: Shortcut key combinations that use the + sign must be entered together. For example, "Ctrl+Home" means you hold down Ctrl and press Home at the same time. Key combinations with a comma work in sequence. For example, the key combination "End, Home" means press End first, release it, and then press Home. Table 1-1. Shortcut Keys for Moving Around a Worksheet
Excel also lets you cross great distances in a single bound using a Ctrl+arrow key combination. These key combinations jump to the edges of your data. Edge cells include cells that are next to other blank cells. For example, if you press Ctrl+ The Ctrl+arrow key combinations are useful if you have more than one table of data in the same worksheet. For example, imagine you have two tables of data, one at the top of a worksheet and one at the bottom. If you are at the top of the first table, you can use Ctrl+ Tip: You can also scroll off into the uncharted regions of the spreadsheet with the help of the scrollbars at the bottom and on the right side of the worksheet. Finding your way around a worksheet is a fundamental part of mastering Excel. Knowing your way around the larger program window is no less important. The next few sections help you get oriented, pointing out the important stuff and letting you know what you can ignore altogether.
1.3.1. The Tabs of the RibbonIn the Introduction you learned about the ribbon, the super-toolbar that offers one-stop shopping for all of Excel's features. All the most important Office applicationsincluding Word, Access, PowerPoint, and Exceluse the new ribbon, However, each program has a different set of tabs and buttons . Throughout this book, you'll dig through the different tabs of the ribbon to find important features. But before you start your journey, it's nice to get a quick overview of what each tab provides. Here's the lowdown:
Note: In some circumstances, you may see a couple of tabs that aren't listed here. Macro programmers and other highly technical types use the Developer tab. (You'll learn how to reveal this tab in Section 28.1.1.) The Add-Ins tab appears when you're viewing workbooks that were created in previous versions of Excel, and which used custom toolbars . (Section A.1.2 has the full story.)
1.3.2. The Formula BarThe formula bar appears above the worksheet grid but below the ribbon (Figure 1-10). It displays the address of the active cell (like A1) on the left edge, and it also shows you the current cell's contents.
You can use the formula bar to enter and edit data, instead of editing directly in your worksheet. This approach is particularly useful when a cell contains a formula or a large amount of information. That's because the formula bar gives you more work room than a typical cell. Just as with in-cell edits, you press Enter to confirm your changes or Esc to cancel them. Or you can use the mouse: When you start tying in the formula bar, a checkmark and an "X" icon appear just to the left of the box where you're typing. Click the checkmark to confirm your entry, or "X" to roll it back. Note: You can hide (or show) the formula bar by choosing View ![]() ![]() Ordinarily, the formula bar's a single line. If you have a really long entry in a cell (like a paragraph's worth of text), you need to scroll from one side to the other. However, there's another optionyou can resize the formula bar so it fits more information, as shown in Figure 1-11.
1.3.3. The Status BarThough people often overlook it, the status bar (Figure 1-12) is a good way to keep on top of Excel's current state. For example, if you save or print a document, the status bar shows the progress of the printing process. If you're performing a quick action, the progress indicator may disappear before you have a chance to even notice it. But if you're performing a time-consuming operationsay, printing out an 87-page table of the airline silverware you happen to ownyou can look to the status bar to see how things are coming along. Tip: To hide or show the status bar, choose View ![]() ![]() | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The status bar combines several different types of information. The leftmost part of the status bar shows the Cell Mode, which displays one of three indicators.
The word "Ready" means that Excel isn't doing anything much at the moment, other than waiting for you to take some action.
The word "Enter" appears when you start typing a new value into a cell.
The word "Edit" means the cell is currently in edit mode, and pressing the left and right arrow keys moves through the cell data, instead of moving from cell to cell. As discussed in Section 1.2, you can place a cell in edit mode or take it out of edit mode by pressing F2.
Farther to the right on the status bar are the view buttons, which let you switch to Page Layout View or Page Break Preview. These different views help you see what your worksheet will look like when you print it. They're covered in Chapter 7.
The zoom slider is next to the view buttons, at the far right edge of the status bar. You can slide it to the left to zoom out (which fits more information into your Excel window at once) or slide it to the right to zoom in (and take a closer look at fewer cells). You can learn more about zooming in Section 7.1.1.
In addition, the status bar displays other miscellaneous indicators. For example, if you press the Scroll Lock key, a Scroll Lock indicator appears on the status bar (next to the "Ready" text). This indicator tells you that you're in scroll mode . In scroll mode, the arrow keys don't move you from one cell to another; instead, they scroll the entire worksheet up, down, or to the side. Scroll mode is a great way to check out another part of your spreadsheet without leaving your current position.
You can control what indicators appear in the status bar by configuring it. To see a full list of possibilities, right-click the status bar. A huge list of options appears, as shown in Figure 1-13. Table 1-2 describes the different status bar options.
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Indicator | Meaning |
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Cell Mode | Shows Ready, Edit, or Enter depending on the state of the current cell, as described in Section 1.3.3. |
Signatures, Information Management Policy, and Permissions | Displays information about the rights and restrictions of the current spreadsheet. These features come into play only if you're using Office SharePoint Server to share spreadsheets among groups of people (usually in a corporate environment). SharePoint is introduced in Section 23.2. |
Caps Lock | Indicates whether Caps Lock mode is on. When Caps Lock is on, every letter you type is automatically capitalized. To turn Caps Lock mode on or off, hit Caps Lock. |
Num Lock | Indicates whether Num Lock mode is on. When this mode is on, you can use the numeric keypad (typically at the right side of your keyboard) to type in numbers more quickly. When this sign's off, the numeric keypad controls cell navigation instead. To turn Num Lock on or off, press Num Lock. |
Scroll Lock | Indicates whether Scroll Lock mode is on. When it's on, you can use the arrow keys to scroll the worksheet without changing the active cell. (In other words, you can control your scrollbars by just using your keyboard.) This feature lets you look at all the information you have in your worksheet without losing track of the cell you're currently in. You can turn Scroll Lock mode on or off by pressing Scroll Lock. |
Fixed Decimal | Indicates when Fixed Decimal mode is on. When this mode is on, Excel automatically adds a set number of decimal places to the values you enter in any cell. For example, if you set Excel to use two fixed decimal places and you type the number 5 into a cell, Excel actually enters 0.05. This seldom-used featured is handy for speed typists who need to enter reams of data in a fixed format. You can turn this feature on or off by selecting Office button |
Overtype Mode | Indicates when Overwrite mode is turned on. Overwrite mode changes how cell edits work. When you edit a cell and Overwrite mode is on, the new characters that you type overwrite existing characters (rather than displacing them). You can turn Overwrite mode on or off by pressing Insert. |
End Mode | Indicates that you've pressed End, which is the first key in many two-key combinations; the next key determines what happens. For example, hit End and then Home to move to the bottom-right cell in your worksheet. See Table 1-1 for a list of key combinations, some of which use End. |
Macro Recording | Macros are automated routines that perform some task in an Excel spreadsheet. The Macro Recording indicator shows a record button (which looks like a red circle superimposed on a worksheet) that lets you start recording a new macro. You'll learn more about macros in Chapter 27. |
Selection Mode | Indicates the current Selection mode. You have two options: normal mode and extended selection . When you press the arrows keys and extended selection is on, Excel automatically selects all the rows and columns you cross. Extended selection is a useful keyboard alternative to dragging your mouse to select swaths of the grid. To turn extended selection on or off, press F8. You'll learn more about selecting cells and moving them around in Chapter 3. |
Page Number | Shows the current page and the total number of pages (as in "Page 1 of 4"). This indicator appears only in Page Layout view (as described in Section 7.2.2). |
Average, Count, Numerical Count, Minimum, Maximum, Sum | Show the result of a calculation on the selected cells. For example, the Sum indicator shows the total of all the numeric cells that are currently selected. You'll take a closer look at this handy trick in Section 3.1.1. |
View Shortcuts | Shows the three view buttons that let you switch between Normal view, Page Layout View (Section 7.2.2), and Page Break Preview (Section 7.3.2). |
Zoom | Shows the current zoom percentage (like 100 percent for a normalsized spreadsheet, and 200 percent for a spreadsheet that's blown up to twice the magnification). |
Zoom Slider | Shows a slider that lets you zoom in closer (by sliding it to the right) or out to see more information at once (by sliding it to the left). |
You might have already seen the Excel Options window, which provides a central hub where you can adjust how Excel looks, behaves, and calculates (see Figure 1-14). To get to this window, click the Office button, and then choose Excel Options on the bottom-right edge.
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The top five sections in the Excel Options window let you tweak a wide variety of different details. Some of these details are truly handy, like the options for opening and saving files (which are described at the end of this chapter). Others are seldom-used holdovers from the past, like the option that lets Excel act like Lotusan ancient piece of spreadsheet softwarewhen you hit the "/" key.
Beneath the top five sections are four more specialized sections:
Customize lets you put your favorite commands on the Quick Access toolbar, a maneuver you can learn more about in the Appendix.
Add-Ins lets you configure other utilities (mini-programs) that work with Excel and enhance its powers. For example, you'll turn to this list to switch on the Solver tool in Chapter 20.
Trust Center lets you tweak Excel's security settings that safeguard against dangerous actions (think: viruses). You need to learn more about these settings before you can use Excel to interact with a database or run macro code. Section 27.3.1 has full details.
Resources provides a few buttons that let you get extra diagnostic information, activate your copy of Office (which you've no doubt done already), and get freebies and updates on the Web (Figure 1-15).
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While you're getting to know Excel, you can comfortably ignore most of what's in the Excel Options window. But you'll return here many times throughout this book to adjust settings and fine-tune the way Excel works.