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.

What is Excel?

It is a spreadsheet application used to enter the data (text, numbers, etc…) to perform calculations, analysis and store it in a 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 tables, charts,etc…

Why Should I Learn MS Excel?

MS Excel is used by many people in so many ways:

• Excel has ability to Store Data and is easy to use and flexible to to do the changes
• Excel makes calculations of complex formulas easy
• Excel works great as a basic reporting tool, you can create Score cards, Dashboards and Rich Visualized Templates
• Excel is used extensively by just about everyone at work, almost every organization use Excel
• Excel can interact with Other Applications and Databases
• Excel is widely using as Data Mining Tool to Process the data, Reporting and Presentations
• Excel has programming Capability, you can code and build the tools to automate your tasks

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 (looks like a Square) where we can enter the data.

On 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 our 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 example:
Pivot Tables helps you to summarize the data and provide the capability to interact with your data.
Charts helps you to present your data by graphs, so that user can understand the data easily.
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, aligning the data and merging the Cells,etc…

Macros and VBA

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

Save a workbook in a new folder

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

You will find the detailed explanation fo using Excel in the next sections