Introduction
The FORMAT of a cell, a range of cells, or a whole sheet, is the look or attributes of that particular element.
Thus:
A cell has a width, depth, border type and
font type, font colour (if inputting text or numbers).
It could have a picture of graphic embedded in it, which will have its
own attributes...etc
Similarly a range of cells can have attributes that apply to the whole
range e.g. a border around the whole range..etc
A sheet can have all the grid lines
displayed or not displayed or have a pattern
throughout the whole sheet to act as a background...etc
Some Important
Formatting Options
- Alignments
- Quick text & background formatting using tools Font / FontSize / Font Colour. & background formatting
- Borders
- Format,
Cells - Number Tab: Text, Number, Date or Custom
- AutoFormat
Alignments
No matter what the content of the sheet - it can
be virtually ruined by bad formatting - even impossible to read.
Correct alignment of text or numbers, as well as use of bold and
colours...etc, will alleviate this problem:
BAD
|
Area |
Mon |
Tue |
Wed |
Thu |
Fri |
|
North |
22 |
33 |
22 |
21 |
2.00 |
|
East |
22.6 |
34 |
21 |
17 |
16.00 |
|
South |
24.78 |
12.65 |
25 |
18 |
18.00 |
|
West |
26 |
22 |
27 |
19 |
9.00 |
|
N/East |
28 |
13 |
26.5 |
14 |
14.00 |
BETTER
|
Area |
Mon |
Tue |
Wed |
Thu |
Fri |
|
North |
£22.00 |
£33.00 |
£22.00 |
£21.00 |
£2.00 |
|
East |
£22.60 |
£34.00 |
£21.00 |
£17.00 |
£16.00 |
|
South |
£24.78 |
£12.65 |
£25.00 |
£18.00 |
£18.00 |
|
West |
£26.00 |
£22.00 |
£27.00 |
£19.00 |
£9.00 |
|
N/East |
£28.00 |
£13.00 |
£26.50 |
£14.00 |
£14.00 |
Make sure that headings are
aligned in accordance with the content data below them.
Use the Align Left, Centre, Align Right tools on
the toolbar
Quick text & background formatting
using tools
By selecting a cell or range of cells and then using the tools on the
toolbar, you can quickly change the font, font size and appearance (bold,
italics,Underline)
Font type, size & appearance
Cell background colour, and Font Colour
Borders
You can set a border on the left, right, top, bottom of a cell or range
of cells, or use outline (all).
You can place borders by using Format,Cells
and using the Border tab.
Note: The tabs for Alignment, Font and Patterns (Background Colour
& Patterns) in the Format Cells
box.
Format, Cells - Number Tab: Text, Number, Date or Custom
Also on the Format Cells box is the Number
tab
The number tab can give many number formats including Date, numbers as
Text...etc. The format is held in the cell whether you are aware of it or not:
|
This cell is blank but it has a format ----------------.> |
2 |
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
on entering the number 2 we get : --------------> |
|
£2.00 |
||
|
(The format is Currency, 2 decimal
places)
|
||||
Important Note on the Date Format
The Date format example showing 03/04/97 will give an Americanisation of any date
entered into the cell - that is month first, followed by the date.
E.g: After using this format, if you enter 10/05/97 for 10 May, it will
result in 05/10/97.
If you get this trouble use the Custom format and the dd/mmm/yyyy mask. This will result in eg:
20/Mar/2000 (no way can it be switched back to USA format)
Space consideration does not allow examples of all these number format -
just use them and get used to them.
