Excel training London and UK

The following is an extract from a hand book used on our Excel courses London schedule. You will find our Excel software training portfolio to be the most comprehensive in our market.

Excel Introduction

Unit 3: Modifying a Worksheet

In this section you will learn how to:

• Move and copy data
• Move and copy formula
• Identify relative and absolute references in a formula
• Create an absolute reference in a formula
• Inserting and deleting ranges
• Use Smart Tag options
  

Moving and Copying Data

Moving involves physically transferring data from one location to another, whereas copying refers to duplicating data so that it appears in more than one location.

There are several methods that can be used to move or copy data.

Dragging and Dropping Cells

To move data from one cell to another using your mouse:

• Select a cell by clicking on it, making it the active cell.
• When you see the thick black border around the cell, move your mouse pointer over one edge of the border. You will see your pointer turn into a four-headed arrow.
• Hold your left mouse button down and drag the cell contents to a new location.
  

If you select a group of cells, the selection will be surrounded by a thick black border. You can mouse drag a selection by grabbing this border, just as you dragged a single cell.

Try it: Switch to Sheet 3 of Sales report.xlsx, use the mouse to move the values in cells C5:C7 to C8:C10. Then use Undo to reverse this action.

How to Cut, Copy, and Paste Cells

By right-mouse click:

• Select the data, then right-click for cut and copy options
• Select the destination cell for the data, then right-click for the paste option

Try it: On Sheet 3 in Sales report.xlsx, move the names that appear in cells A5:A7 to cells A8:A10.
Then use Undo to move the names back to their previous location.

Using the Clipboard group

The clipboard button group is at the far left of the Home Ribbon.

This group of buttons relates to the tasks of cutting, copying, and pasting items from one location to another. The clipboard is the place where copied items are stored until they are needed.

Paste Buttons

The Paste button will paste the most recently cut or copied item from the clipboard to the location starting at the active cell. Items on the clipboard can be text, numbers, cell selections, and more. The clipboard can store up to 24 copied items. (Shortcut key: Ctrl + V)

The bottom paste button (with the small down pointing arrow) will display a menu of paste options when clicked.

Cut Button

This button will remove the selected item from its original location and place it on the clipboard for future use. (Shortcut key: Ctrl + X)

Copy Button

This button will copy a selection or other item from the spreadsheet to the clipboard. Unlike cut, copy will not remove the selection or item from its original location in the spreadsheet. (Shortcut key: Ctrl + C)

You can view the items on your clipboard at any time by clicking the Home tab to display the Home Ribbon, and then clicking the small arrow at the bottom right of the clipboard button.

You can clear all the items from the office clipboard by clicking the Clear All button, or you can paste all of the items on the clipboard by using the Paste All button.

Try it: Display the Clipboard on your screen.
On Sheet 3 of Sales report.xlsx, select cells C5:C7 and copy the cells. The values you have copied will show on the Clipboard.
Select cell C8 then click on the copied values showing on the Clipboard. The values should now be pasted in cells C8:C10. Use Undo to reverse the Paste action.

Moving and copying formulas

In order to understand what happens when formulas are moved or copied, it is important to know about relative cell references and absolute cell references and understand how each type of reference behaves in a formula when moved or copied.

Relative cell references

In Excel, a specific cell can be named or referred to with a cell reference. A simple cell reference is just the letter at the top of the cell’s column, paired with the number at the left of the cell’s row. Cell A1, for example, is the first cell in the top left corner of the Excel grid (first column letter, A, and first row number, 1).

For example, Cell A2 may contain the value 500 while cell B2 contains the value 250. Cell C2 contains a formula (=A2+B2, visible in the formula bar) that adds these two numbers by using their respective cell references.

If you use your mouse to drag the cell containing the formula (C2) down to fill part of the column (using the Fill handle), you will see zeros in the cells that you drag the formula to.

You should also notice that the formula for cell C8 (the active cell) can be read from the formula bar as =A8+B8. But remember, the original formula in C2 (the cell we filled from) was =A2+B2. The formula has changed to reflect the relative positions of the cells. The formula in cell C2 adds the two cells to its immediate left. Each cell that this formula has been filled to, will contain a formula that adds the two cells to its immediate left.

In other words, the formula adopts cell references that are relative to its position in the worksheet. This maintains the same relative positioning of the original formula. This results in zeros in the locations where the cells to the immediate left of the formula are empty.

This is called a relative cell reference, meaning that if the formula is copied (dragged, filled, or copied) the cells involved will change to reflect the formula’s new position.

Try it: On Sheet 1 of Sales report.xlsx, delete the formulas in cells G5 and J5. Copy the formula in cell D5 into cells G5 and J5. Note how the result of the formula changes when it is pasted into these two cells.
On Sheet 1 of Sales report.xlsx use the Fill handle to copy down the formulas created in
D5, G5, J5 and L5 to the next two rows (rows 6 and 7).
Why do you get incorrect formula results appearing in cells L6 and L7? Discuss with your trainer.

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Excel Advanced

Unit 7: Using Templates

In this unit, you will learn how to:

• Access and use Excel’s in-built templates
• Create, modify and use custom templates

What is a Template?

A template is a workbook design or layout that can be saved and reused for any number of workbooks. A template can have formulas, formats, and a host of other Excel features that will be applied to each new workbook that uses the template.

Creating a Workbook from a Template

To open a workbook from a template:

• Select New from the File tab menu.
• Select a template grouping from the categories listed in the panel on the left.
  • Select Installed templates to view inbuilt templates;
  • Select New from Existing to browse for other template files.
  • Select My Templates to view templates saved on the Templates folder on your own hard-drive
• Select the required template file and click Create.

Creating a Template

To create your own template, open Excel 2010 and design your worksheet or workbook layout to meet any specifications you require. You can add labels, formatting, colour, borders, and formulas. If need be, you can even create layouts on different sheets in the workbook, as a template can contain as many worksheets as you need.

Remember, the main purpose of a template is for repeated use of a workbook layout. Keep this in mind when creating a template. Plan your layout, labels, and formats to make your templates comprehensive and complete.

When you have completed your design:

• Choose Save As from the File tab menu
• In the dialogue, enter a name for your template in the File Name text field.
• Display the Save As Type drop-down list near the bottom of the dialogue box
• Select the Excel template option. (You may have to scroll through the list of options to find it). This will save the file as filename.xltx.
• New templates will be automatically saved in the Excel Templates folder. You can choose another folder to save your templates in if you wish, but if you do, you will need to choose the New from Existing option when creating files from the template.

Unit 7 Practice Activity for Excel course London

• Open Practice Group Sales 2.xls from the Practice Files folder
• Copy the qtr1 sheet to another workbook, and close Practice Group Sales 2.xls.
• Edit the copied sheet so it could be reused to enter figures for each quarter.
• Save the file as a template named Quarterly Sales template.