Getting Started In Excel 4
About This Manual 5
Starting and Exiting Excel? 6
The Excel Screen 7
The Mouse Icons 8
What Are All Those Pictures All Over The Screen? 9
Using the Mouse 11
The Right Mouse Button 12
The Office Assistant 13
Basic Principles 14
Cursor Movement & Functions Keys 15
Selecting Cells 17
Selecting Columns & Rows 18
Basic Text & Number Entry 19
Correcting Mistakes 20
Undo & Redo - A Licence To Make Mistakes! 21
Using AUTOFILL To Make Copying Easy! 22
Erasing Cells 24
Getting Excel To Do Your Calculations! 25
Adding Up Numbers With The SUM Function 27
Using AUTOSUM For Quick SUM's 28
Principle: Always Include Blank Line in SUM() 29
Percentages 30
Other Functions That You Can Use 32
The Paste Function 33
Inserting & Deleting Rows and Columns 35
Saving Your WorkBook 37
More Options In Saving 38
Opening, Creating and Closing Workbooks 40
Managing Files in the Open Dialog Box 42
Moving And Copying Things 46
Copying Formulas 47
Absolute Cell References & F4 48
The Golden Rule Of Good Spreadsheet Design 50
Never Put A Number In A Formula 50
Principle: Calculate in One Direction 52
Principle: Check your Spreadsheet 53
Using Sheets In A Workbook 53
Making It Look Good 55
Changing The Look Of Your Text & Numbers 56
Aligning Text & Numbers 57
Other Options In Aligning Text & Numbers 58
Changing The Font (The Typeface) 60
Changing The Look Of Numbers 62
Making Columns Wider & Rows Taller 65
Dates & Times 67
Adding Lines And Borders 68
Adding Colour And Shading 70
Use AUTOFORMAT for instant style! 71
Conditional Formatting 72
Removing & Copying Formatting 73
Seeing More Of The Worksheet On Screen 74
Printing 75
Basic Printing 76
Print Preview: So What Will It Look Like On Paper? 77
Page Setup 78
Making The Printed Output Look Good 80
Headers & Footers 81
Creating Charts 82
Charts: With the Chart Wizard 83
Working With A Chart If It Is Inserted As An Object In A Sheet 87
Using The Chart Toolbar 88
Changing Your Chart After Creating It 89
Formatting Your Chart 90
Printing A Chart 91
Charts: Two Dimensional or Three Dimensional? 92
Charts to Display Trends 93
Charts to Display Proportions 94
Charts to Display Trends & Proportions 95
Making Your Spreadsheet Easier To Use 96
Two Useful Design Rules 97
Grouping Sheets 98
Creating Formulas That Link Worksheets & Workbooks 99
Adding Comments To Your Worksheet 100
Adding A Post-It Type Comment 103
Creating Range Names 104
Using Named Ranges 105
Protecting Your Work 107
Protecting A File 109
Using The Toolbars 110
Spreadsheet Templates 111
Excel Spreadsheet Information In Word 112
Appendix 114
Error Messages 115
Selected List of Functions 116
Full List Of Functions (Alphabetical) 118
Glossary 120
Index 124
Getting Started In Excel
Objectives:
By the end of this section you will be able to:
About This Manual
This manual has been written by Happy Computers for the Excel 97 courses. It is meant as a learning tool for use during the course and a way of exploring further elements of Excel after the course. It is not a replacement to the huge
manuals that come with Excel, but rather a step by step guide to the most useful features.
Write Your Own Manual!
There are sections in this manual that are left blank and it is intended that you should fill these in during the course. Use lots of colour and make it fun, that way it's easier to remember. The manual is only printed on one side of paper so you have plenty of space to make lots of your own notes.
Step by Step Instructions
There are sections within the manual that are step by step guides.
These use the following style
Things you should do are here A description of what's happening is here
Click On File The File Menu will drop down
Click On Print Preview The Print Preview Box will appear
Each step by step section is self contained, you should not need to refer to another part of the manual to get it to work.
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ways to improve our service, and are very keen to hear you thoughts on any aspects of this manual, or indeed, any part of Happy Computers!