29 Excel Formula Tips for all Occasions [and proof that PHD readers truly rock]
Last updated on September 21, 2009
Chandoo
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It is no exaggeration that knowing excel formulas can give you a career boost. From someone starting at the long list of numbers, you can become a data god who can lookup, manipulate and analyze any spreadsheet by learning few excel formulas.
So when our little excel blog hit the 5000 RSS Subscriber milestone, I celebrated the occasion by asking you to share an excel formula through twitter or comments with rest of us. And boy, what an excellent list of formula tips you have shared with us all.
Here is the complete list of entries for the twitter formula contest.
Follow the links next to contributor’s name to see the original twitter post or comment
To return the full Path+Filename of your (saved) workbook
To return the full Path+Filename of your (saved) workbook (and dropping the [] characters) to get, for example, C:\Data\ExcelFiles\MyWorkbook.xls: =SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(LEFT(CELL(”filename”,$A$1), FIND(”]”,CELL(”filename”,$A$1))),”[“,””),”]“,””)
Create a Dynamic Range that Grows and Shrinks with Data
This formula looks up data from another sheet considering three parameters keeping into account the column A and column B with sub-components (both on another sheet) and matching them up with the heading on both sheets. =OFFSET(’Data Sheet’!$C$1,MATCH(D$2,’Data Sheet’!$A$2:$A$140,0)+MATCH($B5,’Data Sheet’!$B$2:$B$20,0)-1,MATCH(D$3,’Data Sheet’!$C$1:$J$1,0)-1)
This formula extracts data from a dynamic data range and returns a zero value if there is an #N/A error. =IF(ISNA(HLOOKUP($A14,Data!$AB$2:$AW$9,MATCH(”P”,Data!$AB$2:$AB$2,0),0)), 0,HLOOKUP($A14,Data!$AB$2:$AW$9,MATCH(”P”,Data!$AB$2:$AB$2,0),0))
Find the difference between maximums of two ranges
Here’s my little contribution (previously posted 😉 Named Ranges (should be dynamic, but….) Ship $A$2:$A$8 Captain $B$2:$B$8 flights $C$2:$C$8 in F:F Summary_ship $F$2:$I$2 this 3:3 Summary_Captain $E$3:$E$6 data is in range A1:C8, and summary is in E1:I6. =SUMPRODUCT((Ship=in Summary_ship)*(Captain=this Summary_Captain)*(flights))
To return the name of the workbook only, e.g. MyWorkbook.xls: =MID(CELL(”filename”,$A$1),FIND(”[“,CELL(“filename”,$A$1))+1,FIND(“]“,CELL(”filename”,$A$1))-FIND(”[”,CELL(”filename”,$A$1))-1)
This formula determines the Active (=”T”) status or otherwise of Employees in an Excel spreadsheet: =IF(AC2=””,”X”,IF(AND(AC2=500000,AD2=””),”T”,IF(AND(AC2500000,AD2?”),”F”,”Pls Enter Leaving Reason!!”)))
Using INDIRECT along with VLOOKUP to make dynamic lookups
=FREQUENCY(DY5:DY118,EU4:EU14) for creating frequency distributions. I can’t believe I went so long before discovering that there’s an easy built-in array function that does this. Constructing the distribution by hand was always a pain.
To return the name fo the current worksheet, e.g. “Sheet1?: =MID(CELL(”filename”,$A$1),FIND(”]”,CELL(”filename”,$A$1))+1, LEN(CELL(”filename”,$A$1))-FIND(”]”,CELL(”filename”,$A$1)))
I wish I had more prizes to give. All the tips are truly marvelous. I have learned several cool uses of excel formulas. But alas, we have only 2 prizes in this contest.
Both the winners are randomly selected. I have already sent them an e-mail with the further instructions to claim the prizes.
Big thank you to Bonavista Systems, the contest sponsor
I would like to thank Andreas from Bonavista systems for sponsoring the dashboard bundle. Bonavista systems makes some really cool tools for excel dashboards, spark-lines and helps you make cleaner and better looking charts. Checkout their products and know more about them from their site.
Further Resources if you want to learn Excel Formulas
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Just thought I would mention, the "weird" custom sort behavior mentioned at 5:45 where "% return" doesn't appear to be sorting is because the "August Purchases" field has the sort preference and since these are such unique values, no additional sorting is possible on the "% return" field. If there were two entries that had the same "Customer Since" year AND the same "August Purchases" amount, THEN you would see a sorting of the "% return" on these two entries.
2 Responses to “Weighted Sorting in Excel ”
Just add a column calculating the "performance" or whatever is your criteria and sort by it? No?
have no patience to waste 13min. Save your time too.
Just thought I would mention, the "weird" custom sort behavior mentioned at 5:45 where "% return" doesn't appear to be sorting is because the "August Purchases" field has the sort preference and since these are such unique values, no additional sorting is possible on the "% return" field. If there were two entries that had the same "Customer Since" year AND the same "August Purchases" amount, THEN you would see a sorting of the "% return" on these two entries.