Don't Get Lost In A Sea Of Data, Use Excel Navigation

Mon 26th September 2011

It's always a good idea when you have captured data into your worksheet, to make sure that anyone reading your report does not get lost trying to negotiate around crucial traits and targets. Excel 2010 has various options to help you around your worksheet quickly.

It's a sad fact that 59% of 1,000 US and UK middle managers say that they frequently miss important information every day because they just can't find the data within their own company. And that an astounding 15% of all paper handled in businesses is lost, with employees using 30% of their day trying to find misplaced documents.

While losing information might not be high-risk in your organisation, it's a good idea that once you have captured data into your worksheet, that you are not going to loose crucial traits and targets through bad navigation.

Worksheets in Excel 2010 can be vast and complex, but there are ways to save time by knowing all your options when it comes to navigating the document so you can find what you want. You can use your mouse or your keyboard to get around. Learn more tips and tricks in one of our data analysis courses UK.

Moving around your workbook is easy: jump to a specific location by clicking the Home tab, selecting Find & Select button, and clicking Go To. Type the address of the cell you want and click OK. Even managing multiple windows is straightforward. Each Excel workbook is contained within an individual window, which includes a title bar, status bar and the other familiar elements. Because your work can quickly become complex, you may well end up with three, four or more windows open on screen at once.

There are different ways to scroll through a worksheet. You can use the arrow keys, the scroll bars, or the mouse to move between cells and to different areas of the worksheet. To move between cells on a worksheet, click any cell or use the arrow keys. When you move to a cell, it becomes the active cell.

The following options will help you to manage windows so you can work with their contents more quickly.

Open up the multiple workbooks you need to work with. Click the View tab. From the Window tool group, select one of the commands: New window opens a new window containing a copy of the workbook; Arrange All arranges the multiple windows tiled, horizontal, vertical or cascade; Switch window lets you choose the name of the workbook you want in front; View Side by Side lets you view two files vertically at the same time. Click the Maximise, Restore, Minimize or Close buttons to arrange the currently active window. You can drag a window by clicking and holding down on its title bar. You can double-click the title bar to maximise or minimise a window.

There are also other ways to navigate quickly and easy around your data. For example to scroll one row up or down, use Scroll Lock, and then use the Up Arrow key or Down Arrow key up or down. To scroll one column left or right, press Scroll Lock, and then use the Left Arrow key or Right Arrow key to scroll one column left or right. And by using Page Up or Page Down, you can scroll one window up or down. Again to scroll one window left or right, simply press Scroll Lock and then hold down Ctrl while pressing the Left Arrow or Right Arrow key.

If you need to scroll over a larger area, press Scroll Lock and them at the same time hold down Ctrl and an arrow key to move through large area of your worksheet. Remember that when Scroll Lock is activated, SCRL is displayed on the status bar. To use the arrow keys to move between cells, you must turn Scroll Lock off.

Or you can use the the scroll bars to move through a worksheet. The size of a scroll box indicates the proportional amount of the used area of the sheet that is visible in the window. The position of a scroll box indicates the relative location of the visible area within the worksheet. You can even split the window so that you can scroll in two or four panes at the same time. Just point to the split box on either the vertical or the horizontal scroll bar. When the pointer becomes a double-headed arrow, drag the split bar onto the worksheet where you want to split the window. Double-click the split bar to remove it.

Of course you can also scroll and zoom by using a mouse and other pointing devices, such as the Microsoft IntelliMouse, have built-in scrolling and zooming capabilities that you can use to move around and zoom in or out on your worksheet or chart sheet. If you use the IntelliMouse pointing device to zoom more often than you use it to scroll on a sheet, you can set the wheel button to zoom instead of scroll. To do this, go to the Tools menu, click Options, click the General tab, and then select the Zoom on roll with IntelliMouse check box.

Author is a freelance copywriter. For more information on excel training in london, please visit https://www.stl-training.co.uk

Original article appears here:
https://www.stl-training.co.uk/article-1989-dont-get-lost-in-sea-data-use-excel-navigation.html