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An IF Formula Challenge for you

  • Last updated on April 25, 2012
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If I were to hire an data analyst, I would simply ask them to write a complex IF formula in Excel. If they can write it, the interview progresses, else, they are out. In other words,

=IF(person_can_write_big_fat_IF_formula=TRUE, proceed_with_interview, say_thanks_and_call_next_person)

If you are able to write IF formulas for any situation, then you are bound to be awesome in Excel.

IF Excel Formula - Sytanx & Explanation

So, to test how well you know your IFs & Boolean functions, let me give you a small challenge.

Galo, one of our readers emailed this to me.

I would like to ask for your help in creating a tracker sheet for rewards program if they meet the qualifiers in order to avail it.
The conditions will be the following:

A.If the attendance is equals to 0% then they will earn Php 1500
If the attendance is less than 3% then they will earn Php 1000 only.

B.If the handling time less than 500 seconds reward will be Php 1000 (applicable only phone call request)
If the handling time less than 560 seconds reward will be Php 1000 (applicable only fax request)
Note: They can never have both phone and fax request

C.If there’s a commendation (1 or more) reward will be Php 1000

D.If the quality audit is 98% -100% reward will be Php 1500
If the quality audit is 96% -97.99 % reward will be Php 500

Overall if they were able to meet all of the qualifiers they can earn Php 5000.

Download the sample data

Click here to download the sample data. Your objective is to fill column I with appropriate IF formula to calculate the Cash bonus component.

Post your answers

Once you complete the formula, share them with me & others using comments. Go ahead and tell me the answer.
Note: when posting your answers, make sure you add space after any < or > symbols. Or else, they will not show up. So instead of writing A1>10, write A1 > 10 or A1 GT 10. Sorry for the extra hassle.

Learn how to use IF formulas

IF formula is an important for any Excel analyst. Read these articles to learn more about IF formula & related formulas.

Thanks to Galo for emailing this question.

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26 Responses to “Get busy this weekend, with OR XOR AND [Excel Homework]”

  1. Stef@n says:
    July 29, 2011 at 11:48 am

    first solution for AND
    The two numbers are in A1 and B1
    = SUBSTITUTE (SUBSTITUTE (A1+B1*9*9, 9, 1), 8, 0)
    regards
    Stef@n

    Reply
  2. Stef@n says:
    July 29, 2011 at 11:50 am

    next solution for OR
    =1*SUBSTITUTE (A1+A2;2;1)

    regards
    Stef@n

    Reply
  3. Stef@n says:
    July 29, 2011 at 11:52 am

    last solution for XOR
    =1*SUBSTITUTE (A1+A2;2;0)

    regards
    Stef@n

    Reply
  4. Irvine says:
    July 29, 2011 at 12:26 pm

    Or you could make use of the VBA logical operators!

    Define the following as custom functions
    Public Function BITXOR(x As Long, y As Long)
    BITXOR = x Xor y
    End Function

    Public Function BITAND(x As Long, y As Long)
    BITAND = x And y
    End Function

    Public Function BITOR(x As Long, y As Long)
    BITOR = x Or y
    End Function

    and then use them such:
    A B =BITOR(A,B) =BITAND(A,B) =BITXOR(A,B)
    0101 0100 0101 0100 0001

    Reply
  5. Stef@n says:
    July 29, 2011 at 12:46 pm

    an another solution for AND
    =1*SUBSTITUTE (SUBSTITUTE (A1+A2;1;0);2;1)

    note:
    the binary numbers are in A1 and A2 !
    regards
    Stef@n

    Reply
  6. Shair says:
    July 29, 2011 at 2:22 pm

    I was obviously playing hooky at the beach during the bit-wise math lesson – you lost me at “Understanding bit-wise operations” 🙂

    Reply
  7. Anup Agarwal says:
    July 30, 2011 at 8:46 am

    After looking at the above solutions, I find my solution silly, but still:

    For the following formulae,
    Row 1: headers,
    Row 2: OR
    Row 3: AND
    Row 4: XOR

    Column 1: Input 1
    Column 2: Input 2
    Column 3: Result

    OR
    {=SUM(IF(MID(A2,ROW(OFFSET($A$1,0,0,LEN(A2),1)),1)+MID(B2,ROW(OFFSET($A$1,0,0,LEN(B2),1)),1)>0,1,0)*10^(LEN(A2)-ROW(OFFSET($A$1,0,0,LEN(B2),1))))}

    AND
    {=SUM(IF(MID(A3,ROW(OFFSET($A$1,0,0,LEN(A3),1)),1)+MID(B3,ROW(OFFSET($A$1,0,0,LEN(B3),1)),1)=2,1,0)*10^(LEN(A3)-ROW(OFFSET($A$1,0,0,LEN(B3),1))))}

    XOR
    {=SUM(IF(MID(A4,ROW(OFFSET($A$1,0,0,LEN(A4),1)),1)+MID(B4,ROW(OFFSET($A$1,0,0,LEN(B4),1)),1)=1,1,0)*10^(LEN(A4)-ROW(OFFSET($A$1,0,0,LEN(B4),1))))}

    Reply
  8. Hui... says:
    July 31, 2011 at 11:57 pm

    @Anup
    Please don't consider your solution silly
    Firstly, You are the 3rd person to submit an answer
    Secondly, The best formula/function is the one that you know and understand.

    Reply
  9. Michael Azer says:
    August 1, 2011 at 1:40 pm

    I think I have a very tedious solution, which people won't have the patience to do except in small numbers.

    I used the same problem setup as "Anup Agarwal"

    AND =IF(AND(MID(B2,1,1)="1",MID(C2,1,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(AND(MID(B2,2,1)="1",MID(C2,2,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(AND(MID(B2,3,1)="1",MID(C2,3,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(AND(MID(B2,4,1)="1",MID(C2,4,1)="1"),1,0)

    OR =IF(OR(MID(B3,1,1)="1",MID(C3,1,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(OR(MID(B3,2,1)="1",MID(C3,2,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(OR(MID(B3,3,1)="1",MID(C3,3,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(OR(MID(B3,4,1)="1",MID(C3,4,1)="1"),1,0)

    =IF(OR(AND(MID(B4,1,1)="1",MID(C4,1,1)="0"),AND(MID(B4,1,1)="0",MID(C4,1,1)="1")),1,0)&IF(OR(AND(MID(B4,2,1)="1",MID(C4,2,1)="0"),AND(MID(B4,2,1)="0",MID(C4,2,1)="1")),1,0)&IF(OR(AND(MID(B4,3,1)="1",MID(C4,3,1)="0"),AND(MID(B4,3,1)="0",MID(C4,3,1)="1")),1,0)&IF(OR(AND(MID(B4,4,1)="1",MID(C4,4,1)="0"),AND(MID(B4,4,1)="0",MID(C4,4,1)="1")),1,0)

    Reply
  10. Michael Azer says:
    August 1, 2011 at 1:43 pm

    Sorry my last post was totally messed up

    AND
    =IF(AND(MID(B2,1,1)="1",MID(C2,1,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(AND(MID(B2,2,1)="1",MID(C2,2,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(AND(MID(B2,3,1)="1",MID(C2,3,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(AND(MID(B2,4,1)="1",MID(C2,4,1)="1"),1,0)
    OR
    =IF(OR(MID(B3,1,1)="1",MID(C3,1,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(OR(MID(B3,2,1)="1",MID(C3,2,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(OR(MID(B3,3,1)="1",MID(C3,3,1)="1"),1,0)&IF(OR(MID(B3,4,1)="1",MID(C3,4,1)="1"),1,0)
    XOR
    =IF(OR(AND(MID(B4,1,1)="1",MID(C4,1,1)="0"),AND(MID(B4,1,1)="0",MID(C4,1,1)="1")),1,0)&IF(OR(AND(MID(B4,2,1)="1",MID(C4,2,1)="0"),AND(MID(B4,2,1)="0",MID(C4,2,1)="1")),1,0)&IF(OR(AND(MID(B4,3,1)="1",MID(C4,3,1)="0"),AND(MID(B4,3,1)="0",MID(C4,3,1)="1")),1,0)&IF(OR(AND(MID(B4,4,1)="1",MID(C4,4,1)="0"),AND(MID(B4,4,1)="0",MID(C4,4,1)="1")),1,0)

    Reply
  11. Stephen says:
    August 1, 2011 at 1:45 pm

    @stefan,
    I just couldn't get your solutions to work.
    01010101010 + 01010101110 = 02020210120
    what am i doing wrong?

    Reply
  12. Stephen says:
    August 1, 2011 at 1:56 pm

    @anup
    ...I got yours to work!

    Reply
  13. Rich says:
    August 1, 2011 at 8:17 pm

    @Stephen - I get the same, but Stef@an's second solution for AND does work (at least for the test cases I used)

    Reply
  14. Stef@n says:
    August 2, 2011 at 9:09 am

    @ Stephen / Rich
    yes , you are right ! - only this works:

    OR
    =1*SUBSTITUTE (A1+A2;2;1)
    XOR
    =1*SUBSTITUTE (A1+A2;2;0)
    AND
    =1*SUBSTITUTE (SUBSTITUTE (A1+A2;1;0);2;1)

    Reply
  15. Michael Azer says:
    August 3, 2011 at 1:36 pm

    @Stef@n - You're answer is really smart, I never knew about the substitute function before. Great Work!

    Reply
  16. Stef@n says:
    August 3, 2011 at 2:45 pm

    Thx Michael 🙂
    yes - it is simply easy 😉
    if you add 1 and 1 - excel calculate 2
    and then you have to substitute the 2 - new = 0 respectively 1

    Reply
  17. Rob says:
    September 11, 2011 at 4:16 pm

    Here is a good resource for people wanting to learn binary and hexadecimal.
    http://justwebware.com/bitwise/bitwise.html

    Reply
  18. Kyle McGhee says:
    January 29, 2012 at 3:57 pm

    Three that weren't asked for:
    NOT
    =SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(A1+A2,0,3),1,0),3,1)

    EQV
    =SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(A1+A2,0,3),2,3),1,0),3,1)

    IMP
    =SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(A1+SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(A2,0,3),1,0),3,1),0,1),2,0)

    (was using Daniel Ferry's bitwise file to verify against)

    Reply
  19. Q says:
    February 27, 2012 at 9:05 am

    @ Kyle

    Not only takes one parameter and inverts 0 -1 and 1-0

    Took out the +A2
    =SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(A1,0,3),1,0),3,1)

    Reply
  20. Richard Tallent says:
    November 1, 2012 at 3:57 pm

    Great solutions!

    I'll add two:

    NAND =1*SUBSTITUTE (A1+A2,2,0)

    NOR=1*SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE (SUBSTITUTE(A1+A2,0,2),1,0),2,1)

    Reply
  21. John Fuller says:
    August 29, 2014 at 4:15 pm

    This will work for binary numbers of any size (although the text format mask will have to have as many zeroes as there are digits in the longest addend)

    Assume binary #s are in C35 & C36, then add and format as text in C37:
    =TEXT(C36+C35,"000000000000")
    -sum- = 101112211112

    AND - SUBSTITUTE 0s for 1s in -sum-, then sub 1s for 2s
    =SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(C37,"1","0"),"2","1")

    OR - sub 1s for 2s in -sum-
    =SUBSTITUTE(C37,"2","1")

    XOR - sub 0s for 2s in -sum-
    =SUBSTITUTE(C37,"2","0")

    Reply
  22. Shane says:
    September 21, 2014 at 3:47 am

    Just wandered by:

    AND:

    =SUBSTITUTE(A1+A2,1,0)/2

    Reply
  23. How do I perform a XOR calucation of two binary numbers in excel 2007 - QuestionFocus says:
    December 9, 2017 at 2:27 pm

    […] post http://www.excelhero.com/blog/2010/01/5-and-3-is-1.html for examples using Sumproduct, and http://chandoo.org/wp/2011/07/29/bitwise-operations-in-excel/ for examples using Text […]

    Reply
  24. Ronald Vonk says:
    December 6, 2018 at 12:00 pm

    Hi Chandoo,

    I am not (yet) really into bitwise calculation, but I am looking for a way to speed up my vba calculation with very big numbers. Would is ben convenient to use bitwise notation for this?

    Best regards,

    Ronald (the Netherlands)
    p.s. love your country!

    Reply

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