How do I teach myself Excel?

[dullard]

The two most critical things in Excel that are not obvious:

$

and

Solver

The $ is for coping and pasting cells where you don't want Excel to automatically change the formula. For example, suppose cell A1 had a value of 10 and cell A2 had a value of 5. Then suppose you typed '=A1' into cell B1. Obviously, B1 will now equal 10. If you copied that into cell B2, what is the value?

Logically, you'd think that if B1 = A1, and you copied B1 into B2, that B2 would equal A1. You'd be wrong. Excel automatically changes things when you copy and paste. B2 is equal to A2 (which has a value of 5), not the A1 (value of 10) that you'd expect. So, to keep the A1 in the formula, you must do this: '=A$1'. The dollar sign says do not change that number 1 automatically. If you want that A to stay constant, then you do this '$A1', or for both A and 1 to be constant do this '$A$1'.

The solver add-in can wait until you know a bit more, but it is the single most powerful and most useful part of Excel.

 

[gaidensensei]

What are you trying to do in it anyways?
If you have ever used a calculator on the PC often then that is pretty much a general summary.

Use the cells as names. A1, B1, etc.

Start off basic by putting a 1 in A1, a 1 in B1. Go to C1 and type =A1+B1 or use your mouse to click them both after you type =

 

[Crusty]

You can do pretty much anything with Excel.... there's even a 3d engine for it.

 

[gaidensensei]

I say ATOT can teach this man faster than any youtube video or book.
Those things are painfully slow, it's like reading someone telling you how to get a glass of water.

 

[Svnla]

I still want to learn how to do Pivot table. Anyone cares to give me a pointer or two?

 

[JulesMaximus]

I still want to learn how to do Pivot table. Anyone cares to give me a pointer or two?

They are pretty easy. Just select the data you want in your table and click create, then select the items you want to see in the table and drop them in where you want them to go. That's an oversimplified version of it but essentially that's what you do.

 

[AreaCode707]

I don't have time over the weekend but I often train users at my work and I'd be happy to spend an hour or so showing you the ropes. PM me if you want and we can set up a time.

 

[AreaCode707]

I still want to learn how to do Pivot table. Anyone cares to give me a pointer or two?

Your data must be properly arranged with column headings clearly designated (easiest way to do this is highlight or bold the column headings.)

Highlight all your source data.

Go to Insert > PivotTable (in Excel 2007; in 2003 it's in Data > PivotTable)

Click "OK"

A new tab will be created with your empty pivot table on it. You will have a sidebar on the right with PivotTable options. All your column headings will be listed there.

Pick a column where every cell is filled out. Drag and drop it into the Data Items section of the pivot table. If this is numeric data it may automatically sum rather than count but you can change that if you want.

Grab another column and drag and drop it into the Rows section of the pivot table. It will now count/sum/whatever all the data by that item.

So for example:
If you have a spreadsheet with circus animals and you drop "feeding costs" into the data items, and then drop "animal type" into the row items it will give you a list of each animal type and the total sum of their feeding costs by type.

 

[SphinxnihpS]

Lotus is better. You can not run Monte Carlo simulations on Excel.

 

[Matthiasa]

Eh its all straight forward, most of the functions have names that make sense. I've used the pmt and irr command way to much for one of my classes.
Though turning what would take forever by hand into something it does in seconds is nice.

 

[rudeguy]

I say ATOT can teach this man faster than any youtube video or book.
Those things are painfully slow, it's like reading someone telling you how to get a glass of water.

Thats the thing...if I sat next to an Excel expert for a couple hours and could ask a couple questions to help me get a feeling for it, I'd be fine. I learn best on the fly like that. If I try to sit and watch a tutorial or read a book...I get bored and lose focus.

For instance: the billing system we use at work is pretty complicated. I sat through 5 weeks of training on it and the only thing I really learned was how to sign in. Once I hit the floor, I played around with it and had it down better than reps that had been there for years. Its not that I'm smarter....its just how my puny brain works.

Would hiring a tutor make sense? I hate classrooms. Maybe some hot college chick is looking to make a couple extra bucks on the weekend? :hmm:

 

[gaidensensei]

Thats the thing...if I sat next to an Excel expert for a couple hours and could ask a couple questions to help me get a feeling for it, I'd be fine. I learn best on the fly like that. If I try to sit and watch a tutorial or read a book...I get bored and lose focus.

For instance: the billing system we use at work is pretty complicated. I sat through 5 weeks of training on it and the only thing I really learned was how to sign in. Once I hit the floor, I played around with it and had it down better than reps that had been there for years. Its not that I'm smarter....its just how my puny brain works.

Would hiring a tutor make sense? I hate classrooms. Maybe some hot college chick is looking to make a couple extra bucks on the weekend? :hmm:

Not sure if there's any excel proficient ladies around, that sounds like a rare occurrence. Not the accountant kind, more like the excel programmer/macro dev kind.

You could look up that session the other guy was offering for you. They can use logmein or some remote access to take over your PC if over-the-net sessions would help.

 

[Jadow]

:thumbsup: One of my favorite functions!

ditto

edit - talkin about vlookup

 

[Jadow]

I am pretty much the Jesus Christ of Excel, and that's thanks to 15 years of self learning. No class taught me anything in Excel.

 

[BoomerD]

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GGLL_enUS336&q=excel+tutorials

 

[AreaCode707]

Would hiring a tutor make sense? I hate classrooms. Maybe some hot college chick is looking to make a couple extra bucks on the weekend? :hmm:

Drop me a PM and I'll set up a web conference, show you what you need to know to get started.

 

[BoomerD]

Drop me a PM and I'll set up a web conference, show you what you need to know to get started.

Damn...I'd like to get in on this...

I'm a good "entry-level" Excel user. I took a couple of basic classes at the Community College, and I can do most basic formulas, sort data, etc., but there's just so dammed much about Excel that I'd like to learn.

 

[DaWhim]

it is spreadsheet. if u have to deal with number a lot, then it will be very useful.

it is best if u can get some data to work on and figure out everything.

shortcut are very useful, so learn them well. it always drive me nuts to see people drag on the side bar forever while all u need to do is holding the shift key + arrow key to go to one end of the populated cells to another.

 

[DaWhim]

I am an expert with excel except the VBA part. Can anyone teach me how to use VBA in excel? good tutorial? guide?

 

[AreaCode707]

Damn...I'd like to get in on this...

I'm a good "entry-level" Excel user. I took a couple of basic classes at the Community College, and I can do most basic formulas, sort data, etc., but there's just so dammed much about Excel that I'd like to learn.

Anytime.

 

[rcpratt]

I am an expert with excel except the VBA part. Can anyone teach me how to use VBA in excel? good tutorial? guide?

I taught myself VBA in a few weeks last summer at work, it was pretty fun. With just a little bit of coding experience it's pretty intuitive. Another great way to learn is to record macros, and then look at the code that those macros create. I really believe that the easiest way to learn it is to just start working at it, google or help search anything you can't figure out, and just keep working at it. I ended up with about 2500 admittedly poorly-optimized lines of code to help our project scheduler...unfortunately nobody else at work was really smart enough to use it...typing numbers into cells is hard.

I used this site a lot. Plenty of other guides out there, can't find them right now.

 

[Hacp]

I like if statements and macros the best. Data analysis is also pretty sweet.

 

[RichUK]

http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/excel/default.aspx

Look at the "Help and How-to" and "Training" links on the left.

 

[FelixDeCat]

I am an expert with excel except the VBA part. Can anyone teach me how to use VBA in excel? good tutorial? guide?

This is where Lotus123 excelled. The macro function was as simple writing down keystrokes, requesting input, doing calcs and producing output.

It would be something like:

[home]
[down 10], [left 4], "input a"(I forgot the exact command)
b=rnd(a,2,1)
etc...

Very simple.

In comparison, using Visual Basic in Excel for basic macros was like trying to write an opera when you were just trying to whistle.

 

[Train]

Drop me a PM and I'll set up a web conference, show you what you need to know to get started.

WHy not set up a webinar and have all of ATOT over?