An Introduction to MS Excel

MS Excel is a commonly used Microsoft Office application. It is a spreadsheet program which is used to save and
analyse numerical data. A spreadsheet is an arrangement of rows and columns. Rows are horizontal vectors, while
columns are vertical vectors. A spreadsheet is also called a worksheet.

Basics of MS Excel

What is MS Excel?

MS Excel is a spreadsheet program where one can record data in the form of tables. It is easy to analyse data in an Excel
spreadsheet. The image given below represents how an Excel spreadsheet looks like:

How to open MS Excel?

To open MS Excel on your computer, follow the steps given below:

 Click on Start

 Then All Programs

 Next step is to click on MS Office

 Then finally, choose the MS-Excel option

Alternatively, you can also click on the Start button and type MS Excel in the search option available.

Applications of Spreadsheets:
There are numerous applications possible using electronic spreadsheets. A few of the common applications are given
below.

 Payment of bills

 Income tax calculations

 Invoices or bills

 Account Statements

 Inventory Control

 Cost-Benefits Analysis

 Financial Accounting

 Tender Evaluation

 Result analysis of students

Advantages of using Electronic spreadsheets:

The electronic spreadsheet offers many advantages over the manual one. The following are some of the main benefits
of electronic spreadsheets.

 Calculations are automated through the built-in mathematical, financial, and statistical functions.

 Accurate results to any desired level of decimal points are possible.

 Worksheets can be quite big in size.

 Any part of the worksheet can be viewed or edited.

 The worksheet can be saved and retrieved later.

 We can merge any part or whole of an existing worksheet with any current or new worksheet.

 Any part or whole of the worksheet can be printed in the desired format.

 We can view worksheet data in the form of graphs or charts.

 We can transfer the worksheet information to any database or word processing software.

What is a cell?

A spreadsheet is in the form of a table comprising rows and columns. The rectangular box at the intersection point
between rows and columns forms a cell. Given below is an image of a cell:
What is Cell Address?

The cell address is the name by which is cell can be addressed. For example, if row 7 is interested in column G, then the
cell address is G7.

Features of MS Excel

Various editing and formatting can be done on an Excel spreadsheet. Discussed below are the various features of MS
Excel.

The image below shows the composition of features in MS Excel:

 File

The File menu is the leftmost item in the Excel ribbon. The File ribbon items enable you to perform file management
functions, including open, save, close, and print. You also use the File menu to import from external sources into Excel,
along with options that allow you to tweak Excel itself.

 Home

 Comprises options like font size, font styles, font colour, background colour, alignment, formatting
options and styles, insertion and deletion of cells and editing options. The Home menu is the second
menu in the Excel menu bar. The Home ribbon items include options for formatting font, color,
conditional formatting, filter, number type, and more. All these functions help one in performing
various effective calculations.

 Insert
  Comprises options like table format and style, inserting images and figures, adding graphs, charts and
sparklines, header and footer option, equation and symbols. As the name suggests, the Insert
menu helps you insert various options and items into an Excel spreadsheet. You can insert a
variety of things ranging from pivot table to picture, clip art, shapes, screen shots, charts and
graphs, text box, header and footer, symbols, equation, and more.

 Page Layout

 Themes, orientation and page setup options are available under the page layout option. Again, the
name suggests the collection of functions on the Page Layout menu. You’ll see many options
for configuring pages for viewing and printing—including page size, margins, colors and fonts,
and so forth. You can also customize cell height and width on the Page Layout menu.

 Formulas

 Since tables with a large amount of data can be created in MS excel, under this feature, you can add
formulas to your table and get quicker solutions . The Formulas menu is where you find all the number-
crunching options. Excel comes with lots of formulas including financial, logical, text, date & time,
lookup & reference, and math & trigonometry.

 Data

 Adding external data (from the web), filtering options and data tools are available under this category.
The Data menu also contains many important functions in Excel, including imports and connections
with databases. You also access the sort, filter, remove duplicates, data validation, consolidation, group,
ungroup, and subtotal functions on the Data menu.

 Review

 Proofreading can be done for an excel sheet (like spell check) in the review category and a reader can
add comments in this part . Earlier in this article, we mentioned Excel’s ability to collaborate on
spreadsheets. The Review menu is where many of those tasks take place. You can make comments in
cells for your colleagues, check spelling, track changes, and even restrict permission using items in the
Review menu.

 View

 Different views in which we want the spreadsheet to be displayed can be edited here. Options to zoom
in and out and pane arrangement are available under this category. On the View menu, you customize
the way spreadsheets appear on your screen. Options include displaying grid lines between cells,
toggling the formula bar and headings, and more. This menu also gives you options to view and record
macros, as well—macros let you record common steps you perform so you don’t have to repeat the
same things over and over again!
Benefits of Using MS Excel

MS Excel is widely used for various purposes because the data is easy to save, and information can be added and
removed without any discomfort and less hard work.

Given below are a few important benefits of using MS Excel:

 Easy To Store Data: Since there is no limit to the amount of information that can be saved in a spreadsheet, MS
Excel is widely used to save data or to analyse data. Filtering information in Excel is easy and convenient.

 Easy To Recover Data: If the information is written on a piece of paper, finding it may take longer, however, this
is not the case with excel spreadsheets. Finding and recovering data is easy.

 Application of Mathematical Formulas: Doing calculations has become easier and less time-taking with the
formulas option in MS excel

 More Secure: These spreadsheets can be password secured in a laptop or personal computer and the
probability of losing them is way lesser in comparison to data written in registers or piece of paper.

 Data at One Place: Earlier, data was to be kept in different files and registers when the paperwork was done.
Now, this has become convenient as more than one worksheet can be added in a single MS Excel file.

 Neater and Clearer Visibility of Information: When the data is saved in the form of a table, analysing it
becomes easier. Thus, information is a spreadsheet that is more readable and understandable.
Window Features
The purpose of the window features is to enable the user to perform routine
tasks related to the Microsoft applications. All the Office applications share a
common appearance and similar features. The window features provide a
quick means to execute commands. Here are some pertinent Excel features:

Spreadsheet Terms

Term Description
1 Quick Access Toolbar Displays quick access to commonly used commands.

2 Search Bar Advance search will help you find and perform tasks.

3 Title Bar Displays the name of the application file.

 4 File Tab The File tab has replaced the Office button. It helps you to manage
the Microsoft application and provide access to its options such as
Open, New, Save, As Print, etc.
5 Name Box Displays the active cell location.
6 Cell The intersection of a row and column; cells are always named with
the column letter followed by the row number (e.g. A1 and
AB209); cells may contain text, numbers and formulas.
7 Range One or more adjacent cells. A range is identified by its first and last
cell address, separated by a colon. Example ranges are B5:B8,
A1:B1 and A1:G240.
8 Status Bar Displays information about the current worksheet.
9 New Sheet Add a new sheet button.
10 Ribbon Displays groups of related commands within tabs. Each tab
provides buttons for commands.
11 Formula Bar Input formulas and perform calculations.
12 Worksheet A grid of cells that are more than 16,000 columns wide (A-Z, AA-AZ,
BA-BZ…IV) and more than 1,000,000 rows long.

13 View Option Display worksheet view mode.

Mouse Pointer Styles

The Excel mouse pointer takes on many different appearances as you move
around the spreadsheet. The following table summarizes the most common
mouse pointer appearances:

Pointer Example Description

The white plus sign will select a single cell
to enter data, retype data or delete text
from the selected cell. This pointer is also
useful for selecting a range of cells.
The white arrow will drag the contents of
the selected cell to a new location (drag
and drop).
The black plus sign activates the fill handle
of the selected cell and will fill the
adjoining cells with some type of series,
depending on the type of data (e.g., a
formula or date) is in the beginning cell.
 Spreadsheet Navigation
The following table provides various methods to navigation around a spreadsheet.

Method Description
mouse pointer Use the mouse pointer to select a cell.
scroll bars Use the horizontal and vertical scroll bars to move around the
spreadsheet to view columns and rows not currently visible. Click the
mouse pointer once the desired cell is visible.
arrow keys Use the left , right , up , and down  arrows to move accordingly
among cells.
Enter Press the Enter key to move down one cell at a time.
Tab Press the Tab key to move one cell to the right.
Ctrl+Home Moves the cursor to cell A1.
Ctrl+End Moves the cursor to the last cell of used space on the worksheet, which is
the cell at the intersection of the right-most used column and the
bottom-most used row (in the lower-right corner).
End + arrow key Moves the cursor to the next or last cell in the current column or row
which contains information.