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Excel

What is a Worksheet ?

A worksheet is the name given to the large grid where you actually perform your calculations.

A worksheet can be thought of as a single sheet of paper.

Worksheets are where you store your data and you will typically have more than one worksheet in a workbook.

 Worksheet

Every worksheet has 256 columns (A - IV) and 65,536 rows.

This means that every worksheet contains 16,777,216 individual cells. This cannot be changed.

The exact number of cells displayed at any one time depends on the size of the screen, screen resolution and video driver.

Each intersection of a row and a column defines a cell and this cell can be identified by its unique address.

What is a Cell Address ?

A cell address is made up of the column letter followed by the row number.

For example the cell that is the intersection of column "B" with row "2" has a unique cell address of "B2".

Every cell on a worksheet has a unique address.

The Name box in the top left corner always displays the address of the active cell.

 Example of a cell address

The following are all examples of cell addresses: A1, B2, D200, CC56, IV6000.

The active cell is the cell that is currently selected.

Using Worksheets

At any one time there can only ever be one Active Worksheet and one Active Cell.

To move between worksheets just select a different sheet tab at the bottom.

These are located at the bottom left of the workbook, next to the horizontal scroll bar.

You can select a sheet tab to make that particular sheet active.

You can alternatively use the navigation arrow keys to the left of the sheet tabs.

There are four navigation arrows provided and they allow you to quickly move around between multiple worksheets.

 First - Selects the first worksheet in the active workbook.

 Left - Selects the worksheet to the left of the left of the active worksheet.

 Right - Selects the worksheet to the right of the active worksheet.

 Last - Selects the last worksheet in the active workbook.

It is a lot simpler when using sheet names in formulas and range names if you do not use spaces in your worksheet names. Always use the underscore instead of a space.

Using the Worksheet Shortcut Menu

Selecting a sheet tab with the right mouse button will select that particular sheet and will display the worksheet shortcut menu.

 Worksheet shortcut menu

This menu is very useful and provides you with the following commands.

Ungroup Sheets - This will de-select all the worksheets that are currently grouped, leaving you with the worksheet that is currently active.

Insert - This will insert a new worksheet "before" the currently selected sheet. A dialog box is displayed to allow you to choose the type of sheet you would like to insert. Alternatively you can select (Insert > Worksheet) to insert a new worksheet.

Delete - This will remove the selected worksheet. There is no prompt to confirm.

Rename - This will allow you to rename the sheet. Alternatively you can just double click the sheet tab and type in the new name.

Move or Copy - This allows you to move sheets around within a workbook, between workbooks or to new workbooks. Alternatively you can just drag and drop the sheet tabs to re-arrange the order. To quickly copy a worksheet, select the worksheet and hold down the Ctrl key while you drag the sheet tab.

Select All Sheets - This will select all the sheets in the active workbook. To select multiple worksheets you can use the Shift key to select adjacent sheets or use the Ctrl key to select non adjacent worksheets. When you have finished press the right mouse button on any of the selected sheets and select "Ungroup sheets". Alternatively just press one of the non selected sheets.

Tab Color - This will display a dialog box allowing you to colour code that particular sheet tab.

View Code - This is related to Visual Basic and will be covered later on.

Things to Remember

It is very important to know the distinction between a sheet and a worksheet. A worksheet is a type of sheet. There are several other types, for example a chart sheet.

You can change the default number of worksheets that appear in a new workbook by selecting (Tools > Options)(General tab, Sheets in new workbook). This can vary from 1 to 255.

There is no restriction on the number of worksheets you can add to a workbook.

The quickest way to copy an existing worksheet is to hold down the Ctrl key while you drag the sheet tab.

Each worksheet has 256 columns (A-IV) and 65,536 rows. Therefore every worksheet contains 16,777,216 individual cells.