Rama, one of our readers emailed this:
Hello Chandoo I am very new to vba. Help me with this
Q) I Have Many List boxes In That I need to Hide Few Of them Using Check box
Example:If I have List boxes Like A,A1,B,B1
If I Check On Check box A(Captioned As A) It Should show A,A1 List boxes. If I Unchecked it Should Hide A,A1 List boxes
In a similar manner if i checked Check box B .It Should show B,B1 List boxes. If I Unchecked it Should Hide B,B1 List boxes
Show Hide list boxes by using a check box
We can use check box and a bit of VBA to do this easily. First see this demo:

How to show or hide list boxes – Video
Although the concept behind this is very simple, explaining it in a post will make it very long. So I made a 10 minute video. Please watch it below:
[Watch this on our youtube page]
For more on this technique – see Customer Service Dashboard article.
To insert check boxes & list boxes see this tutorial.
Download example workbook
Click here to download the example workbook to understand this technique better. Examine the code in module 1 & 2 to know more.
How do you hide / show things using VBA?
Selectively hiding or showing is a great way to enhance your models, dashboards or reports. I use this technique very often. Most of my dashboards, products etc. contain interactive help that user can see or hide with a click. In background, I use few lines of VBA to do this magic.
What about you? Do you face similar situations? How do you handle them? Share your VBA tips & ideas using comments.
Are you new to VBA?
If so, you have hit a treasure chest. Start with our Excel VBA page and get the basics. Once you are ready to take a deep dive, go thru dozens of VBA / Macro Examples.
And when you want more, consider joining our VBA classes.














11 Responses to “Use Alt+Enter to get multiple lines in a cell [spreadcheats]”
@Chandoo:
One more useful trick.......
In a column you have no. of data in rows and need to copy in the next row from the previous row, no need to go for the previous rows but entering Alt + down arrow, you will get the list of data, (in asending order), entered in the previous rows...
This is another great tip. I use this all the time to make sense of some *very* long formulas. As soon as the formula is debugged I remove the break.
Great tip Chandoo!
I use this feature often and it has even gotten the, "how did you do that" response.
Thanks!
@Ketan: Alt+down arrow is an awesome tip. I never knew it and now I am using it everyday.
@Jorge, Tony: Agree... 🙂
[...] Day 1: Insert Line Breaks in a Cell [...]
how can we merge a two sheet.
excellent idea. Chandoo you are genious
Hi chandoo,
I have used ctrl+enter to break the cell. But I did not get the result.
Please tell me how can i break the cell in multiple lines.
Hi, Ranveer,
Its not Ctrl+enter to break the cell, use Alt+Enter to make it happen.
hi Chandoo....
how we can use Alt+Enter in multiple rows at the same time please reply hurry i have lot of work and have no time and i m stuck in this. 🙁
Alt+J worked once 🙁
So I found another more reliable way:
=SUBSTITUTE(A2,CHAR(13),"")
Where A2 is the cell that contains the line breaks which the code for it is CHAR(13). It will replace it with whatever inside the ""