PRACTICAL WORK 02 - SPREADSHEETS

PRACTICAL WORK 02 - SPREADSHEETS

Goals of this practical work: at the end of the practical class you will know

-to open and save files using Microsoft Excel

-to perform basic operations with data: select, copy, move, delete

-to perform computations using available data, using functions typed or chosen from menus

-to create charts based on existing data

-to automatically create data series using different MS Excel options and shortcuts

Introduction. Microsoft Excel

A spreadsheet or an electronic spreadsheet is a software for organizing and analysing data displayed

as a table, where we can write both text and (especially) numbers. Spreadsheets developed as

computerized simulations of paper accounting worksheets.

Microsoft Excel, part of Microsoft Office, is a spreadsheet application developed by Microsoft for

Windows and Mac OS X. It features calculation and graphing tools, pivot tables and other advanced

features; it also represents the ¡°industry standard¡± for spreadsheets.

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Fig.1. Launghing MS Excel 2010

In this practical work you will learn to use the Microsoft Excel 2010 version of this

spreadsheet program.

To launch the application, press the START button, move the mouse cursor over the ¡°All

Programs¡± button and select ¡°Microsoft Office¡± from the list that appears. In the list of shortcuts

displayed under MS Office you will find Microsoft Excel 2010 - just click once on it, using the left

mouse button and you will start the program. On some computers you can find shortcuts directly on

the desktop or on the START menu.

At startup, the program will create and open a new file (¡°workbook¡±), containing three pages

(¡°worksheets¡±); because of this, the window that appears will look like the following picture

(Fig.2), having a structure similar to a table as the main element.

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Title bar

Menu bar

Tool bar

Formula bar

Column names

Cell

Row numbers

Column

Row

Fig.2. Overview of MS Excel 2010 interface

On the ¡°View¡± menu you should check if the ¡°Formula bar¡± is selected. This is an area containing

two cells, a smaller one where the name of the current cell is displayed (the red circle on the picture

above) and a larger one where the actual text that was written in the current cell is displayed (in

case we input a formula, only the result will be displayed into the spreadsheet, while on the

¡°Formula bar¡± we will see the text of the formula).

Saving and opening a file

In order not to accidentally lose data, you should often save the file you work

on. To do this, please click on the ¡°File¡± menu, then on the ¡°Save¡± option.

A window similar to the next one should appear, if you save the file for the first

time. The same window shows up if you choose the ¡°Save as¡­¡± option, when

you want to rename or save in a different location the current file. If you press

the ¡°Save¡± button while working on a previously saved file, you will not be

prompted again for a name or a location, only the information in the file will be

updated.

To save the file, first please choose the following location: Computer DATA(D:) - ENG1, to save the file in.

Write in the ¡°File name¡° textbox the name you want to use (e.g.¡±Table¡±) and

choose in the "Save as type" box the desired output format for your file and it¡¯s

corresponding file extension. To finish, press the ¡°Save¡± button, located on the

the bottom-right corner of the window

Save your file with the name "Table", keeping the file type automatically chosen

by MS Excel - ".xlsx". After pressing the "Save" button, you will notice that on

the title bar at the top of the MS Excel program window the new name of the file

is written - "Table.xlsx".

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Fig.3.Dialogue windows for the ¡°Save¡± and ¡°Save As¡± options

To open a file, choose the ¡°Open¡­¡± option from the ¡°File¡± menu, then browse the folders for the

location where you know the file is stored. After selecting the desired file, press the ¡°Open¡± button,

located in the bottom-right part of the window.

If you need to create another document, you can use the File menu, select New, then ¡°Blank

Workbook¡±

Data input

To start working with MS Excel, please type in the table the data displayed below:

This data represent the temperature measurements recorded every 4 hours for a patient, for a five

days period of time.

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Basic operations with data ¨C Select, Copy, Move, Delete

To copy or move data on a spreadsheet, first you have to select that data. You can do this using the

mouse - press the left button then drag the mouse cursor over the area where the desired cells are,

thus creating a selection rectangle. The color of the selected cells will change, usually becoming

blue. This way, an entire block of cells will be selected.

You can also select a block of cells using the Shift key ¨C if you click on a cell, then Shift-click on

another cell, the rectangular area that has those two cells as opposing corners will be selected.

After you select the data, perform the desired command ¨C ¡°Copy¡± for copying data or ¡°Cut¡± for

moving data. You can select those commands from the ¡°Home¡± menu or from the pop-menu that

appears when you right-click the selection (see picture below), or you can use the shortcuts, ¨C

Ctrl+¡±C¡± for ¡°Copy¡± and Ctrl+¡±X¡± for ¡°Cut¡±.

The third step consists on selecting the first cell of the new location or the entire area where you

want the data copied.

To conclude the copying, perform the ¡°Paste¡± command - choose it from the ¡°Home¡± menu or the

right-click menu or use the Ctrl+¡±V¡± shortcut.

As an exercise, please copy the data on the first column of your table, from A1 to A7, to the right of

the table, in a location starting from G1. Use the following pictures as a guide to complete this task.

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If you want to move data in Excel, you can to use the ¡°Cut¡± and ¡°Paste¡± commands, in a similar

way as for copying. But you have another option, to drag the selected data to a new location, by

placing the mouse cursor on the border of the selection rectangle (see below its shape when it

touches the selection border), holding the left mouse button and dragging the data to the desired

area.

Please move the data you copied before, now located into the G1:G7 cells, to the next column to the

right, starting from H1.

To complete the exercise, delete the data you just moved, located now into the H1:H7 cells. If you

use the right-click menu and select ¡°Delete¡±, a new window will appear, asking how to replace the

cells that will be removed from the worksheet. This will not happen if you press the ¡°Delete¡± key

on the keyboard, because that way you perform, in fact, the ¡°Clear Contents¡± command - the cells

are not removed, only their content is.

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