Viewing Spreadsheets

Modules >>
Excel II >>
Viewing Spreadsheets

There are some preferences that can be set for viewing your spreadsheets. First, each spreadsheet tab can be labelled. Second, you can choose which cells you want to view as you scroll through your spreadsheet.

Naming spreadsheet tabs

Each spreadsheet in your workbook has its own tab, which can be found at the bottom of the sheet. In any new workbook, three sheets automatically appear and are named Sheet1, Sheet2, and Sheet3 by default. In your XXXdata file, you may only see one sheet with a tab named after the title of your data file.

For your assignment, rename the tab of the Statistics Canada data sheet in your XXXdata workbook. To do this,

In your XXXdata file, right-click on the tab for the sheet containing the Statistics Canada data you imported.
Select "Rename" from the pop-up menu
Name this sheet "StatCan"

You will have to name each additional spreadsheet you create for your assignment. Instructions on what to name each of them will be provided in the following lessons.

Moving or Copying a spreadsheet

The next part of this lesson involves learning how to set viewing options for your spreadsheets. Before we can get into this, you will need to create more spreadsheets within your workbook - each being a copy of the StatCan data. To do this,

With the StatCan spreadsheet visible, go to the Edit menu and choose "Move or Copy Sheet" to get the following window (a shortcut is to right-click on top of the spreadsheet tab and choose "Move or Copy").

The "To book" drop-down menu will allow you to copy or move a sheet to even another workbook - either existing (if currently open) or new. For your assignment, you will be creating a copy of your first sheet within the same workbook, so keep your XXXdata spreadsheet selected in this menu.
Next, you get to choose whether you want this new sheet to appear before the StatCan sheet or to move it to the end. Select (move to end) as shown in the image above.
Lastly, since you want to create a copy of this sheet (as opposed to moving it), put a checkmark in the "Create a copy" checkbox. You may get a warning that some of the cells contain more than 255 characters in them and any text beyond 255 characters won't be copied. This is fine. We won't be missing the information provided past the first 255 characters.
Click OK.
A duplicate spreadsheet named "StatCan (2)" will appear.
Rename this second spreadsheet "Split Bar"
Repeat the above steps to copy the spreadsheet and create a third spreadsheet - another duplicate of the StatCan data.
Rename this third spreadsheet "Freeze Panes"
Create one more copy of the StatCan spreadsheet.
Name the fourth spreadsheet "Sort"

Split Bar View

In the Word I module, you learned how to split the document view into two panes. The same technique applies for splitting the spreadsheet view. If you need a refresher, please return to that lesson in Word to review the split bar feature by clicking here. Dual splits can be used to divide your screen as well. In this case, both a vertical and a horizontal split appear where you have selected a cell. To create a dual split, you must select a cell that is not in row one or column one. For your assignment, you are asked to use the split bar to divide your "Split Bar" spreadsheet (the second spreadsheet in your workbook) into two or more panes. Where you choose to divide the page is up to you. To do this,

Click on a cell where you want the split to occur
Go to the Window tab and select Split

Each pane that is created from this split will have its own scroll bar, so you can move through cells in each pane.

If you ever wish to remove a split, you have three ways of doing this:

Drag the split to the top of the screen until it disappears
Double-click on the split
Go to the Window menu and select "Remove Split"

Freeze Panes

With your third spreadsheet, you will demonstrate a second viewing option. You will freeze the display of certain cells within your spreadsheet - these could be titles at the top of a column or at the front of a row (like student name for row and assignment description for column). This is different from the split bar feature, which allows a pane to have its own scrolling ability. To freeze panes, you would use the same approach as that for creating dual panes with the split bar. That is, select a cell where you want the "freezing" to occur. Some options for selecting cells and what that will do to your spreadsheet is described below.

If you want only a left column to remain on display as you scroll right, you would click on the cell at row 1 and column B.
If you wanted the first row to always display as you scrolled down, you would click on the cell at row 2 and column A.
If you wanted the above two options - both the left column and the top row to be on display - you would click on the cell at row 2 and column B.
If you wanted the top five rows to always display, you would click on row 6 and column A.

For your assignment, you can choose where you want your freezing to occur. To make the freeze once your "dividing" cell is selected,

Go to the Window menu
Select Freeze Panes

If you ever wish to undo a freeze,

Return to the Window menu
Select Unfreeze Panes.

Keep the freeze active for this spreadsheet, though, as it is required for your assignment.

Please continue to the next section on Sorting Records.