Excel 2007 For Dummies

Headers and footers typically appear on every page of a report. In Excel 2007, a header is printed in the top margin, and a footer is printed in the bottom margin. Headers and footers are often used to identify the document used to produce the report and to display the page numbers and the date and time of printing.

With themes, Excel 2007 introduces a whole new way to uniformly format all the text and graphics in a worksheet. You can do this by simply clicking the thumbnail of the new theme you want to use in the Themes drop-down gallery, which you open by clicking the Themes button on the Page Layout tab of the Ribbon. Use Live Preview to see how the text and graphics you’ve added to your worksheet appear in the new theme before you click its thumbnail.

In Excel 2007, you can apply a predefined table format to a data table. The Format as Table feature displays an extensive Table gallery with the formatting thumbnails divided into three sections — Light, Medium, and Dark — each of which describes the intensity of the colors used by it various formats. Click any cell within the group of cells you want to format as a table.

Many Excel 2007 worksheets use percentages to show interest rates, growth rates, inflation rates, and so on. When you apply the Percent Style format to a value that has already been entered in a cell, Excel multiplies the value by 100 and displays the result with a percent sign. To insert a percentage in a cell as you are entering a value, type the percent sign (%) after the number.

You can open multiple workbook windows in Excel 2007 and arrange them into windows of varying displays so that you can view different parts of a worksheet from each workbook on the screen at one time. After you arrange windows, activate the one you want to use (if it’s not already selected) by clicking it. In the case of the cascade arrangement (described below), you need to click the worksheet window’s title bar, or you can click its button on the taskbar.

Some formulas that you create in Excel 2007 use constant values, such as a 7.5% tax rate or a 10% discount rate. Assign names to these values and then use their names in the formulas that you create. Then, you don’t have to enter these constants into a cell of the worksheet in order to use the formulas. Follow these steps to assign a name to a constant value: On the Formulas tab, click Define Name in the Defined Names group.

Excel 2007's AutoCorrect feature already knows to automatically fix two initial capital letters in an entry, to capitalize the names of the days of the week, and to replace a set number of text entries and typos with particular substitute text. But you can use AutoCorrect to alert Excel to your own particular typing errors and tell the program how it should automatically fix them for you.

When entering vast quantities of data in Microsoft Office Excel 2007, it’s easy for typos to creep into your work. How you correct mistakes in Excel 2007 depends upon whether you notice the error before or after you complete the cell entry. You can edit mistakes as they happen, or after you’ve entered data in cells: If you catch the mistake before you complete a cell entry, you can delete characters by pressing Backspace as necessary.

The command buttons on the Chart Tools Layout tab in Excel 2007 make it easy to change or customize particular parts of your chart. This customization includes buttons in the following groups on the Layout tab: Use the Chart Tools Layout tab to customize elements in a chart. Insert group Click the Picture button to insert a picture from a file into the chart, such as a company logo.

When you first start using Microsoft Office Excel 2007, Excel wants to save files in the My Documents (Windows XP) or the Documents (Windows Vista) folder under your user name on your hard drive. So, for example, the directory path of the default folder where Excel 2007 automatically saves new workbook files on a computer running Windows XP is C:Documents and Settings<i>user</i><i>name</i>My Documents However, the directory path of the default folder where Excel 2007 automatically saves new workbook files on a computer running Windows Vista is C:Users<i>use</i><i>rname</i>Documents The generic My Documents or Documents folders may not be where you want new workbooks you create to be automatically saved.

As an alternative to using the ribbon in Excel 2007, these shortcut keystrokes (Alt + hot key) get you moving quickly through basic spreadsheet editing functions. Hot Keys Excel Ribbon Command Function Alt+HVP Home | Paste | Paste Pastes the currently cut or copied cell selection or graphic objects in the wor

You can use the View Side by Side command button on the View tab in Excel 2007 to quickly and easily do a side-by-side comparison of any two worksheet windows that you have open. When you click this button after opening two workbook windows, Excel automatically tiles the windows. To compare two worksheets side by side, follow these steps:Open the two workbooks you want to compare.

A pivot table is a special type of summary table that’s totally unique to Excel 2007. Pivot tables are great for summarizing values in a table because they do their magic without making you create formulas to perform the calculations. Pivot tables also let you play around with the arrangement of the summarized data.

After using Scenario Manager to add scenarios to a table in a worksheet, you can have Excel 2007 produce a summary report. This report displays the changing and resulting values not only for all the scenarios you’ve defined but also the current values that are entered into the changing cells in the worksheet table at the time you generate the report.

After you create a pivot table in Excel 2007, you can create a pivot chart to display its summary values graphically. You also can format a pivot chart to improve its appearance. You can use any of the chart types available with Excel when you create a pivot chart. Create a pivot chart Follow these steps to create a pivot chart based on an existing pivot table in a worksheet: Create the pivot table and then click any cell in the pivot table on which you want to base the chart.

The Quick Access toolbar in Microsoft Office Excel 2007 appears above the Ribbon, to the right of the Office button, and includes buttons for commands you use often. By default, the Quick Access toolbar contains only the Save, Undo, and Redo commands. To display the Quick Access toolbar beneath the Ribbon, click the Customize Quick Access Toolbar button (on the right end of the toolbar) and choose Show Below the Ribbon on the drop-down menu.

When you add a chart to an Excel 2007 workbook, a new Chart Tools Design tab appears in the Ribbon. You can use the command buttons on the Chart Tools Design tab to customize the chart type and style. The Design tab contains the following groups of buttons: Type group Click the Change Chart Type button to change the type of chart, for example, to change from a bar chart to a line chart or a pie graph.

You can use the Cut, Copy, and Paste commands to move or copy information in an Office Excel 2007 worksheet. These commands use the Office Clipboard as a kind of electronic halfway house where the information you cut or copy remains until you decide to paste it somewhere. Because of this Clipboard arrangement, you can use these commands to move or copy information to any other worksheet open in Excel or even to other programs running in Windows (such as a Word document).

Office Excel 2007 supports the use of a new XML-based file format that Microsoft officially calls the Microsoft Office Open XML format. This new file format carries the filename extension .xlsx for Excel workbooks and .xlsm for macro-enabled workbooks. The new format is more efficient, resulting in smaller file sizes and offering superior integration with external data sources.

In Microsoft Office Excel 2007, when you need to delete data, remove formatting in a cell selection, or remove entire cells, rows, or columns, you have many options depending on your objective. Excel can perform two kinds of cell deletions in a worksheet: clearing cell data and deleting the cell. Clearing cell contents Clearing just deletes or empties the cell’s contents or formatting without removing the cell from the worksheet, which would alter the layout of the surrounding cells.

Many Excel 2007 worksheets include financial data, so you’ll likely use either the Currency or Accounting number formats when working with this data. You can easily assign these formats to selected cells by choosing Currency or Accounting from the Number Format drop-down list in the Number group on the Home tab.

Excel 2007 offers a document recovery feature that can help you if a computer crashes due to a power failure or some sort of operating system freeze or shutdown. Excel's AutoRecover feature saves your workbooks at regular intervals. In the event of a computer crash, Excel displays a Document Recovery task pane the next time you start Excel after rebooting the computer.

As you work with Excel 2007 tables, you will often find the need to edit or delete records and perform routine maintenance on the table. You can edit the records manually in the worksheet or use a data form to make the necessary changes. For example, you can use the data form to locate a record you want to change and then make the edits to the particular fields.

When a clip art image or imported picture is selected, Excel 2007 adds the Picture Tools Format tab to the Ribbon. Use the commands on the Picture Tools Format tab if you need to edit or format clip art or pictures in your worksheets. The Picture Tools Format tab is divided into four groups: Adjust, Picture Styles, Arrange, and Size.

Excel 2007’s Scenario Manager lets you create and save sets of different input values that produce different calculated results as named scenarios (such as Best Case, Worst Case, and Most Likely Case). The key to creating the various scenarios for a table is to identify the various cells in the data whose values can vary in each scenario.

The Status bar appears at the bottom of the Microsoft Office Excel 2007 window and keeps you informed of Excel’s current mode and any special keys you engage. In addition, you can use the status bar to select a new worksheet view and to zoom in and out on the worksheet. The Status bar contains the following areas: Mode button that indicates the current state of the Excel program (Ready, Edit, and so on) as well as any special keys that are engaged (Caps Lock, Num Lock, and Scroll Lock) Macro Recording button (small worksheet icon with a red dot) that opens the Record Macro dialog box, where you can set the parameters for a new macro and begin recording it AutoCalculate indicator that displays the Average and Sum of all the numerical entries in the current selection along with the Count of every cell in the selection Layout selector that enables you to select between three layouts for the worksheet area: Normal: Default view that shows the worksheet cells with the column and row headings Page Layout: View that displays rulers, page margins, headers and footers, and shows page breaks for the worksheet Page Break Preview: Enables you to adjust the paging of a report Zoom slider that enables you to zoom in and out on the cells in the worksheet area by dragging the slider to the right or left, respectively View and change settings (such as Zoom and the worksheet view) in the Status bar.

In Microsoft Office Excel 2007, using the keystroke shortcuts (Alt + hot keys) instead of the ribbon will get you quickly through common view, file, and editing commands.

When you start Microsoft Office Excel 2007, you see the first of three worksheets (named Sheet1) in a workbook file (named Book1) inside a program window. The Excel 2007 program window is made up of the following components: Office button that when clicked opens the Office pull-down menu containing all the file-related commands, including Save, Open, Print, and Exit as well as the Excel Options button that enables you to change Excel’s default settings.

The Formula bar in Microsoft Office Excel 2007 displays the cell address and the contents of the current cell. Use the Formula bar to enter or edit formulas and cell entries and assign names to cells. The Formula bar appears just below the Ribbon and is divided into three sections: Name box: The left-most section that displays the address of the current cell Formula bar buttons: The middle section that displays an indented circle on the left (used to narrow or widen the Name box) with the Function Wizard button (labeled fx) on the right; you also see a Cancel (an X) and an Enter (a check mark) button in this middle section of the Formula bar when you enter or edit cell data Cell contents: The third, right-most white area to the immediate right of the Function Wizard button that takes up the rest of the bar and expands down as necessary for lengthy cell entries What you type appears in the current cell and on the Formula bar.

Just as you can filter an Excel 2007 pivot table to display a subset of data, you also can use the PivotChart Filter pane to filter a pivot chart so that it shows just the information you want it to show. When you graph the data in an pivot table using a typical chart type, such as column, bar, or line chart that uses both an x- and y-axis, the Row labels in the pivot table appear along the x- or category-axis at the bottom of the chart, and the Column labels in the pivot table become the data series that are delineated in the chart’s legend.

You can filter and sort the data in an Excel 2007 pivot table to display a subset of data arranged how you want to view it. Excel automatically adds drop-down filter arrows to the Report Filter field as well as the labels for the Column and Row fields. These filter arrows enable you to filter out all but certain entries in any of these fields, and in the case of the Column and Row fields, to sort their entries in the table.

The Ribbon in Microsoft Office Excel 2007 contains seven tabs. Contextual tabs also appear when you’re working with a particular object that you select in the worksheet, such as a graphic image, chart, or PivotTable. If you’re new to Excel 2007, take a few moments to become familiar with where the commands are located on the Ribbon tabs.

Finding the Excel 2007 Ribbon equivalents for the buttons that were on the Formatting toolbar in earlier versions of Excel is easy. Each button on the Formatting toolbar is prominently displayed on the Home tab of the Excel 2007 Ribbon. They’re all easy to identify because they use the same icons as before and are located in the Font, Alignment, and Number groups on the Home tab.

When you add chart titles, Excel 2007 uses the Calibri (Body) font for the chart title (in 18-point size) and the x- and y-axis (in 10-point size). To change the font used in a title, or to change any of its attributes, select the title and then use the appropriate command buttons in the Font group on the Home tab.

The Chart Tools Format tab in Excel 2007 contains command buttons that make it easy to format chart elements you select. Excel gives you a choice of methods for selecting individual chart elements: Click the element directly in the chart to select it — use the ScreenTip that appears at the mouse pointer to identify the chart object before you click to select it.

Excel 2007 makes formatting a new pivot table you’ve added to a worksheet as quick and easy as formatting any other table of data. The PivotTable Tools Design tab includes special formatting options for pivot tables. Refine the Pivot Table style Follow these steps to apply a style to a pivot table: Select any cell in the pivot table and click the Design tab.

When charting values, Excel 2007 isn’t always careful how it formats the values that appear on the y-axis (or the x-axis when using some chart types, such as the 3-D Column chart or the XY Scatter chart). If you’re not happy with the way the values appear on either the x-axis or y-axis, you can easily change the formatting.

The Selection and Visibility task pane in Excel 2007 enables you to control whether various graphic objects in the worksheet are hidden or displayed. Hiding objects can make it easier to select other objects that are hidden or partially hidden behind them. The way you open the Selection and Visibility task pane depends on the type of graphic object you’ve selected in the worksheet: Charts: Click the Selection Pane button in the Arrange group of the Chart Tools Format tab.

In Excel 2007, you can add borders to certain cells to emphasize or define sections of a worksheet or table. Use the Borders button in the Font group of the Home tab to add borders of varying styles and colors to any or all sides of the cell selection. Don’t confuse the borders that you add to accent a particular cell selection with the gridlines normally used to define cell borders in the worksheet — borders that you add are printed whether or not you print the worksheet gridlines.

Excel 2007’s SmartArt is a whole new breed of graphic object that gives the ability to quickly and easily construct fancy graphical lists and diagrams in your worksheet. SmartArt lists and diagrams come in a wide array of configurations that let you combine your own text with the predefined graphic shapes. Choosing a SmartArt graphic To choose and insert a SmartArt diagram, follow these steps: On the Insert tab, click the SmartArt button in the Illustrations group.

If you want to start Microsoft Office Excel 2007 by clicking a single button, you can add the Excel icon to the Quick Launch toolbar. The Quick Launch toolbar resides to the immediate right of the Start button at the beginning of the Windows taskbar. Follow these steps to add the Excel 2007 program icon to the Quick Launch toolbar: Display the Windows desktop and drag the Excel 2007 desktop shortcut icon to the Quick Launch toolbar.

After you’ve created an Excel 2007 table (using the Table button on the Insert tab), you can choose from several methods for adding records to the table. Before you add records, the range must already be formatted as a table. To format a worksheet range as a table, select a cell in the range and then click the Table button on the Insert tab.

You can assign a macro created in Excel 2007 to a custom button on the Quick Access toolbar and then run it by clicking that button. This provides quicker access to a macro than using the Macro dialog box.Click the Office Button and then click the Excel Options button.The Excel Options dialog box appears. Click the Customize tab.

You can add emphasis to selected cells in an Excel 2007 worksheet by changing the fill color or applying a pattern or gradient effect to the cells. If you’re using a black-and-white printer, restrict your color choices to light gray in the color palette and use a simple pattern for cells that contain text so that the text remains legible.

Excel 2007 provides a variety of number formats that you can apply to the values (numbers) you enter in a worksheet to make the data easier to interpret. These number formats include currency, accounting, percentage, date, time, fraction, and scientific, as well as a few special formats. How you enter values into an Excel 2007 worksheet determines the type of number format that they get.

Many formulas that you create in Excel 2007 perform multiple operations. Excel performs each operation, moving from left to right, in a strict pecking order. This is the natural order of arithmetic operations, sometimes called the order of operations, outlined in the table below. You can use parentheses to change the order of operations, even nesting sets of parentheses within each other.

Microsoft Office Excel 2007 includes a built-in spell checker that can catch and get rid of spelling errors and typos in your worksheets. Excel 2007's spell checker normally looks for misspellings only in the current worksheet. If you have a multiple-sheet workbook, you can select the sheets you want to check before you start the spell checker.

To create a one-variable data table to perform what-if analysis in Excel 2007, you enter a series of input values either across columns of a single row or down the rows of a single column. The formulas in a one-variable data table refer to only one input cell: a row input cell for input values entered across a row or a column input cell for input values entered down a column.

You can create a table in Excel 2007 (a list or database in previous Excel versions) to help you manage and analyze related data. The purpose of an Excel table is not so much to calculate new values but rather to store lots of information in a consistent manner, making it easier to format, sort, and filter worksheet data.

As entries go in Excel 2007, formulas are the real workhorses of the worksheet. If you set up a formula properly, it computes the right answer when you first enter it into a cell. From then on, it keeps itself up to date, recalculating the results whenever you change any of the values that the formula uses. You let Excel know that you’re about to enter a formula in the current cell by starting the formula with the equal sign (=).

When you work with Excel 2007 tables, you can use keystrokes or a data form to move through table records until you find the one you want to edit or delete. In larger tables, you can use search criteria in the data form to look up a record. These methods also work with a normal range of data — one that has not been converted to a table using the Table button on the Insert tab.

In Excel 2007, you can use Web queries to import data directly from various Web pages that contain financial and other types of statistical data that you need to work with in a worksheet. To create a new Web query, follow these steps:Click the From Web command button in the Get External Data group on the Data tab.

Clip art is the name given to over 150,000 readymade illustrations offered by Microsoft for use in its various Microsoft Office programs, including Excel 2007. Clip art drawings are so numerous that the images are classified into different categories ranging from Abstract to Web Elements.Click the Clip Art button in the Illustration group on the Ribbon’s Insert tab.

In Excel 2007, you can insert pictures such as digital photos or scanned images that are saved as graphics files into your worksheets. If you want to bring in a graphic image created in another graphics program that’s not saved in its own file, you select the graphic in that program and then copy it to the Clipboard (press Ctrl+C).

You can insert graphic shapes such as lines, rectangles, block arrows, stars, and other basic shapes into your Excel 2007 charts and worksheets. All you need to do is select a thumbnail on the Shapes drop-down gallery on the Insert tab of the Ribbon and then drag the shape out in the worksheet.On the Insert tab, click the Shapes button in the Illustrations group.

Excel 2007 makes it easy to enter symbols, such as foreign currency indicators, as well as special characters, like trademark and copyright symbols, into Excel's cells. These symbols are available in the Symbol dialog box. To add a special symbol or character to a cell entry you’re making or editing, follow these steps:Click the Insert tab and then click the Symbol button in the Text group.

Excel 2007 automatically displays new pivot charts on the same worksheet as the pivot table. However, if you move the pivot chart to its own sheet in the workbook, you may find it easier to customize and work with it. You can always move the chart back to the worksheet later, if you prefer.Click the PivotChart Tools Design tab on the Ribbon.

In Excel 2007, you may need to move or copy a particular worksheet from one workbook to another. You can use the Move or Copy dialog box to simplify the process. To move or copy worksheets between workbooks, follow these steps:Open the workbook with the worksheet(s) that you want to move or copy and the workbook that is to contain the moved or copied worksheet(s).

A basic printing technique you may need in Excel 2007 is how to print the worksheet formulas instead of printing the calculated results of the formulas. You can check over a printout of the formulas in your worksheet to make sure that you haven’t done anything stupid (like replace a formula with a number or use the wrong cell references in a formula) before you distribute the worksheet companywide.

Excel 2007 includes a Protect Workbook command that prevents others from making changes to the layout of the worksheets in a workbook. You can assign a password when you protect a workbook so that only those who know the password can unprotect the workbook and make changes to the structure and layout of the worksheets.

As you work in Microsoft Office Excel 2007, remember to save your work often or you risk losing your Excel data if the computer crashes or the power goes out. When you save a workbook for the first time, you see the Save As dialog box. The appearance and functionality of the Save As dialog box varies depending on whether you are running Excel 2007 on Windows Vista or Windows XP.

Microsoft Office Excel 2007 lets you save your workbook files directly in the PDF (Portable Document File) file format developed by Adobe Systems Incorporated. This format enables people to open and print your Excel worksheets (documents from myriad other applications) even if they don't have Excel on their computers.

In Excel 2007, you can create a custom series of names, locations, or other items that you use frequently and then use the AutoFill handle to automatically fill these list items in order in a workbook. For example, say your company has offices in several locations, and you get tired of typing out the sequence in each new worksheet that requires them.

Excel 2007 includes the Research task pane that you can use to search for information from online resources, such as the Encarta Dictionary, Thesaurus, MSN Money Stock Quotes, and the Encarta Encyclopedia. Note that because all of the resources are online, you must have Internet access available to use the Research task pane.

Use the Wrap Text button on the Home tab of Excel 2007 to wrap lengthy text in a cell by displaying it on multiple lines within the cell. This feature helps you avoid the problem of having to abbreviate text or widen columns in order to display all the text contained within cells. When you select Wrap Text, Excel continues to use the horizontal and vertical alignment you specify for the cell.

If you need to add new data within an existing Microsoft Office Excel 2007 worksheet, you can insert new cells, columns, or rows rather than going through all the trouble of moving and rearranging several individual cell ranges. To insert new cells, rows, or columns in an Excel worksheet, follow these steps: Select the cells, rows, or columns where you want the new, blank cells to appear.

If you need to enter a bunch of numbers in an Excel 2007 worksheet that use the same number of decimal places, you can turn on Excel’s Fixed Decimal setting and have the program enter the decimals for you. All you do is type the digits and complete the entry in the cell. For example, to enter the numeric value 100.

The Ribbon interface in Microsoft Office Excel 2007 radically changes how you work. You no longer need to find on which pull-down menu or toolbar a command resides. Instead, the Ribbon shows you the most commonly used commands and options to perform a particular Excel task. You’ll find the Ribbon near the top of the Excel 2007 window.

In the top-left corner of the Excel 2007 window, you find the Office button (the round button with the Office four-color icon), which provides access to common file-related commands. The Office button replaces the File menu from previous versions of Excel and also includes commands new to Excel 2007. Find the Office button in the upper-left corner of the Excel 2007 window.

You can merge and center data horizontally or vertically across multiple cells in Excel 2007. You also can unmerge or split a merged cell into its original, individual cells. A common use of merge and center in Excel 2007 is to horizontally center a worksheet title over a table. You can only split a cell that has previously been merged.

By default, Excel 2007 uses the SUM function to create subtotals and grand totals for the numeric field(s) that you assign as the Data Items in a pivot table. Some pivot tables, however, require the use of another summary function, such as AVERAGE or COUNT. To change the summary function that Excel uses in a pivot table, follow these steps: Double-click the Sum Of field label that’s located at the cell intersection of the first Column and Row Field in a pivot table.

Pivot tables are much more dynamic than standard Excel 2007 tables because they are so easy to manipulate and modify. Excel makes it just as easy to change which fields from the original data source are displayed in the table as it is to add them when a table is first created. In addition, you can instantly restructure the pivot table by dragging its existing fields to new positions on the table.

After you create a new chart in an Excel 2007 worksheet, you can easily move or resize the embedded chart. Whenever an embedded chart is selected (as it is automatically immediately after creating it or after clicking any part of it), the Chart Tools contextual tab with its Design, Layout, and Format tabs appears on the Ribbon, and Excel outlines each group of cells represented in the selected chart in a different color in the worksheet.

Each new workbook you open in Excel 2007 contains three blank worksheets, although you can add many more. You can easily move between the worksheets in an Excel workbook by using the sheet tabs, the Sheet Tab scroll buttons, and keyboard shortcuts. To activate a worksheet for editing, you select it by clicking its sheet tab.

You use the Open dialog box in Office Excel 2007 to open an existing workbook. The appearance and functionality of Excel's Open dialog box differs slightly depending on whether you're running Excel 2007 on Windows Vista or Windows XP. If you want to open a workbook that was open recently, you don’t have to bother with the Open dialog box.

Excel 2007 automatically embeds new charts on the same worksheet as the source data, but you may find it easier to work with a chart if you move the chart to its own chart sheet in the workbook.Click the Move Chart button on the Chart Tools Design tab to open the Move Chart dialog box.If you don’t see the Chart Tools Design tab, click the chart to select it and make this tab appear.

With Excel 2007’s data tables, you enter a series of possible values that Excel plugs into a single formula so you can perform what-if analysis on the data. What-if analysis enables you to explore the possibilities in a worksheet by inputting a variety of promising or probable values into the same equation and letting you see the possible outcomes in the worksheet.

If you can use the default print settings to print all the cells in the current worksheet, printing in Excel 2007 is a breeze. Simply add the Quick Print button to the Quick Access toolbar (by clicking the Customize Quick Access Toolbar button and then clicking Quick Print on its drop-down menu). If you need to change common settings however, such as selecting a different printer or specifying a range of pages to print rather than the entire worksheet, use the Print dialog box (press Ctrl+P).

After you finalize an Excel 2007 worksheet by reviewing formulas and proofing text, you should consider protecting the document to guard against any unplanned changes. Each cell in the worksheet can be locked or unlocked. By default, Excel locks all the cells in a protected worksheet, and then you can specify which cells you want to unlock for editing (if any).

Excel 2007 can import data from an Access 2007 database table into a worksheet, a process known as making an external data query. After importing the data into Excel, you can then use the Filter buttons attached to the various fields to sort and filter the data as in an Excel table. To make an external data query to an Access 2007 database table, follow these steps: Click the From Access command button in the Get External Data group on the Data tab.

The sheet names that Excel 2007 uses for the tabs in a workbook (Sheet1 through Sheet3) are not very descriptive. Luckily, you can easily rename a worksheet tab to whatever helps you remember what you put on the worksheet, provided that this descriptive name is no longer than 31 characters.Double-click the sheet tab you want to rename.

You can use the horizontal scroll bar in Microsoft Office Excel 2007 to scroll left and right in a worksheet and the vertical scroll bar to scroll up and down. The horizontal scroll bar appears at the bottom of the Worksheet area, while the vertical scroll bar appears to the right of the Worksheet area. Here are some scrolling techniques for navigating in an Excel worksheet: To scroll one column or row at a time in a particular direction, click the appropriate scroll arrow at the ends of the scroll bar.

If you want to open a workbook in Office Excel 2007, but can’t remember the filename or location, you can use the Search feature to find the missing workbook. To use Excel's Search feature, you only need to remember a portion of the filename or some of the text contained within the workbook. Searching for workbooks when running Excel 2007 on Windows Vista When you run Excel 2007 under Windows Vista, the new operating system adds a Search text box to the Open dialog box that lets you search for missing workbooks from within the dialog box.

Instead of using the ribbon for your basic file functions in Excel 2007, check out this chart for keystroke shortcuts ( Alt + hot key) to get your spreadsheet basic commands quickly accomplished. Hot Keys Excel Ribbon Command Function Alt+FN Microsoft Office Button | New Displays the New Workbook dialog box where you can open a blank workbook or one from a template Alt+FO Microsoft Office Button | Open Displays the Open dialog box where you can select a new Excel workbook to open for editing or printing Alt+FS Microsoft Office Button | Save Saves changes to a workbook.

If you want to change the way you're looking at an Excel 2007 spreadsheet, or the way the page is laid out, use these view command shortcuts (Alt + hot key). Hot Keys Excel Ribbon Command Function Alt+WN View | Normal View Returns the worksheet to normal view from Page Layout or Page Break Preview Alt+WP View

Microsoft Office Excel 2007 offers a variety of keyboard shortcuts for selecting a new cell. When you use one of these keystrokes, the program automatically scrolls a new part of the worksheet into view, if this is required to move the cell cursor. You’ll find these keystrokes and their actions in the following table.

In Excel 2007, you can split the worksheet window into separate panes and scroll the worksheet in each pane so that you can easily compare data from two separate worksheet locations. You can make the panes in a workbook window disappear by double-clicking anywhere on the split bar that divides the window. To split a worksheet into two (upper and lower) horizontal panes, you can drag the split bar — located right above the scroll arrow at the very top of the vertical scroll bar — down until the window divides as you want it.

Microsoft Office Excel 2007 provides several methods for starting and exiting the program. You can open Excel by using the Start menu or a desktop shortcut. When you want to exit Excel, you can do so by using the Office button, the Close button, or a keyboard shortcut. Starting Excel 2007 from the Start menu To start Excel 2007, choose Start→All Programs→Microsoft Office→Microsoft Office Excel 2007.

When you're ready to enter data to a worksheet in a Microsoft Excel 2007 workbook, there are a few simple guidelines (a kind of data-entry etiquette) that you should keep in mind: Try to organize your information in tables of data that use adjacent (neighboring) columns and rows. Start the tables in the upper-left corner of the worksheet and work your way down the sheet, rather than across the sheet.

The AutoComplete feature in Office Excel 2007 anticipates what you might want to enter next based upon text you just entered, thus reducing errors and speeding up your work. AutoComplete comes into play only when you’re entering a column of text entries. AutoComplete looks at the kinds of entries that you make in that column and automatically duplicates them in subsequent rows whenever you start a new entry that begins with the same letter or letters as an existing entry.

Add-in programs are small modules that extend the power of Excel 2007 by giving you access to a wide array of features and calculating functions not otherwise offered in the application. There are three different types of add-ins: Built-in add-ins available when you install Excel 2007. Add-ins that you download for Excel 2007 from Microsoft Office Online.

Microsoft Office Excel 2007 displays contextual tools with tabs and commands that help you work with a particular object that you select in the worksheet — such as a graphic image you’ve added or a chart or PivotTable you’ve created. These contextual tools appear only when you need them. The name of the contextual tools for the selected object appears immediately above the tab or tabs associated with the tools.

Drag and drop is a mouse technique that you can use in Office Excel 2007 to pick up a cell selection and drop it into a new place on the worksheet. Although drag and drop is primarily a technique for moving cell entries around a worksheet, you can also adapt it to copy a cell selection.Select a cell range.This method works with both a single cell and a contiguous range of cells.

The Goal Seek feature in Excel 2007 is a what-if analysis tool that enables you to find the input values needed to achieve a goal or objective. To use Goal Seek, you select the cell containing the formula that will return the result you’re seeking and then indicate the target value you want the formula to return and the location of the input value that Excel can change to reach the target.

Microsoft Office Excel 2007 normally copies all the information in the range of cells you select when you paste the data. Use Excel's Paste Special command to specify other options, such as pasting only the cell contents (without the formatting) or only the formatting (without the cell contents). To paste particular parts of a cell selection, click the drop-down button that appears at the bottom of the Paste command button on the Ribbon’s Home tab.

The Undo feature in Office Excel 2007 can quickly correct mistakes that you make in a worksheet. The Redo button lets you "undo the undo." The Undo button appears next to the Save button on the Quick Access toolbar and it changes in response to whatever action you just took; the Redo button becomes active whenever you use Undo.

The Office Clipboard can store multiple cuts and copies from any Office program running under Windows, not just Excel 2007. In Excel, this means that you can continue to paste stuff from the Office Clipboard into a workbook even after finishing a move or copy operation. Use the following techniques to work with the Office Clipboard in Excel 2007: To open the Office Clipboard in its own task pane to the immediate left of the Worksheet area, click the Dialog Box launcher button in the lower-right corner of the Clipboard group on the Ribbon’s Home tab.

The Comma Style format (also known as the thousands separator) in Excel 2007 often accompanies the Accounting number format. Like the Accounting format, the Comma format inserts commas in larger numbers to separate thousands, hundred thousands, millions, and . . . well, you get the idea. The Comma Style format also displays two decimal places and puts negative values in parentheses.

Microsoft Office Excel 2007 makes it easy to apply common formatting changes to a cell selection right within the Worksheet area, thanks to its new mini toolbar feature. The Excel 2007 mini toolbar contains these buttons from the specified groups on the Home tab: Font group: Font, Font Size, Increase Font Size, Decrease Font Size, Bold, Italic, Border, Fill Color, and Font Color (all buttons in this group except the Underline button) Alignment group: Center and Merge & Center buttons Number group: Accounting Number Format, Percent Style, Comma Style, Increase Decimal, and Decrease Decimal buttons Clipboard group: Format Painter button.

You can use the Zoom slider on the Status bar in Microsoft Office Excel 2007 to increase the magnification in a worksheet or shrink it down to the tiniest size to get an overall picture of the worksheet data. The Zoom dialog box provides another way to change the zoom magnification.Find the Zoom slider.The Zoom slider lives on the far right end of the Status bar, next to the View buttons.