Getting Started with Microsoft Excel

In this section I will introduce the basic features of Microsoft Excel, one of the tools in the MS Office Package suite.

What is Excel?

Microsoft Excel is a very popular spreadsheet application. It has effectively become the standard and these days the word 'Excel' is synonymous with 'spreadsheet'. Excel is a spreadsheet application used to enter the data (text, numbers, etc…) to perform calculations, analysis and store it in a excel file. There are many built-in functions and formulas allow you to perform calculations and you can create attractive, readable presentations and rich visualized dashboards including charts, table,etc…

Why Should I Learn MS Excel?

MS Excel is used with many purpose because Excel:

§  has ability to Store Data and is easy to use and flexible to do the  any changes

§  can makes calculations of complex formulas

§  can works great as a basic reporting tool, you can Dashboards and Rich Visualized Templates

§  can interact with Other Applications and Databases

§  is widely using as Data Mining Tool to Process the data, Reporting and Presentations

§  has programming Capability, you can code and build the tools to automate your tasks known as “Macro”.

Starting Excel

You can start Excel by
1. Double Click on the Excel Icon on your Desktop
Or
2. Go To Run and type excel to Start Excel Application
Or
3. Click on Start Button => Select All Programs => Select Microsoft Office => Click On Excel to Start Excel Application

Exploring the Excel Interface

When you Start Excel Application, it will Open an Excel Workbook, It is the main file having collection of Worksheets. Each Worksheet look like table with Rows and Columns, and the smaller entity in the Worksheet is called a Cell where we can enter the data.

At the top of the Worksheet you can find Menu Bar also called Ribbon, collection of built-in functions and utilities are available to execute our tasks.

Entering and Editing Data

We can enter text, numbers,dates in a Cell and we can modify and update the existing data.

Formulas and Functions

There are number of formulas and functions available in Excel to deal with your data to get the required results.

Excel Built-in Tools

There are number of tools available in Excel, which help you to play with your data to achieve required results.

For instance:

Charts helps you to present your data by graphs, so that user can understand the data easily.

Pivot Tables helps you to summarize the data and provide the capability to interact with your data.
The other tools like Filters, Sort,Text-to-Column,etc.. helps you to do lot more with your data.

Formatting Data

We can change the look and feel of the data by formatting the Fonts Styles, background color, aligning the data and merging the Cells,etc…

Macros and VBA

Excel has the Macro language to help in automating your task. You can automate pa particular task and save lot of time and generate more accurate outputs.

Save a workbook

Once you are done with your task, you can save the file at a specific location with a desired name.