Excel Easter Eggs (Issue 66) by Tiamari

This time of the year it is almost impossible to find chocolate Easter eggs anywhere. But if you are hunting for some hidden goodies, there are always a few treasures that one can find in Excel… if you are looking in the right places.

RESEARCH PANE

If you use the Thesaurus feature in MS Word often, you might have noticed that it is seemingly missing in Excel. Bummer, right?

Well, it may not be on the right-click menu, but don’t despair. If you look on the REVIEW tab, in the PROOFING group, you will see a button called RESEARCH. It will launch the Research panel with a full dictionary which includes synonyms and translations to other languages. You can also use Alt+click on a word.

TAGGING DOCUMENTS

Sometimes, with even the best intentions at the beginning of a project, one’s digital filing system gets all disorganized and you cannot find your stuff anymore.

Often there are documents that relate to each other, but cannot logically be filed into the same folder. The folder you save it in today may not necessarily make sense six months down the line when you are looking for the document.

It helps to add tags to your documents. On the FILE tab, under “Properties” on the right hand side you can add tags that you can later search for. To search for tags in Windows Explorer, simply type “tags:“ in the search bar, and then type the tag words that you are looking for.

FILE PATH FIELDS

You have a printed copy in your hands… but the Excel document on your computer seems to have been eaten by the folder monster!

One option to keep track of where you keep digital documents is to insert the file path as a footer.

Another option is to insert the file path in a cell. Simply type =CELL("filename") and press enter. A good idea is to make it less obtrusive by changing the format to a light gray and a fairly small font, and insert it somewhere at the bottom of your document.

BANDED ROWS

Banded rows (or columns) makes it easier to read data. To create banded rows, do the following:

Select the range. Then click on “Conditional Formatting” on the HOME tab (STYLES group) and select “New Rule” from the drop down menu. Select "Use formula to determine which cells to format” and enter the following code:

=iseven(row())

Then, click on “format” and choose a fill colour. Click "OK" twice to apply the formula.

NEED HELP WITH EXCEL?

Struggling to implement these tips? Please feel free to book a session with me.

My email address is email@tiamari.com

Happy Clicking!