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To change the font in a cell or range of cells:
- Right click on the cell (or highlight the range and right click
in the highlighted area).
- Select Format Cells... from the context menu, then
select the Font tab.
- Click on a font name in the list on the left to preview the
font.
- Change the font style and/or size by clicking on the appropriate
items (bold, italic, etc.).
- Add color or other special enhancements such as underlining, sub-
or superscript.
- Click OK.
After selecting a cell or range of cells, select a line style by
clicking on it in the Line Style box. To apply the border, click
on one or more of the buttons in the Border area (left, right,
top, bottom, diagonal, outline, inside, etc.).
NOTE: If you have selected a range of cells and select only the
Outline option, Excel will put an outline around the
outside of the range, but not around the individual cells. If you want
an outline and lines around each cell, click on both the
Outline and Inside buttons. You can do
them separately if you want, for instance, a heavier line around the
outside and a lighter one around individual cells.
Use the Color drop-down box to select line color (you
won't be able to print in color without a color printer, though!). The
default (Automatic) is black.
Use Patterns to select background colors and fill
patterns for a cell or a range of cells. Be careful: text is more
difficult to read against a dark background. Be sure to experiment
with a small area before applying patterns and printing a whole
worksheet.
Apply a pattern to a few cells and print a sample to see how it
looks (many of the 'patterns' appear to be solid gray when printed; the
patterns are too fine to see without a magnifying glass!). If you plan
on making copies of your printout, make a copy of the sample to see if
you can still read it. If the fill color or pattern is too dark when
copied, try something different. If all else fails, try outlining
important sections with a different border style.
Even though you won't be able to print in color on your black and
white printer, color-coding data in your worksheets can make important
items stand out when you're working in a sheet. Just make sure that
you print it in black and white (see Printing).
Protecting a worksheet is useful if you've created a fill-in form
and you don't want users to be able to change the labels. By protecting
the worksheet but leaving data entry areas unprotected, you can be sure
that labels, etc., won't be changed.
To limit user access to only the cells where want them to be able to
enter data, you can protect the worksheet.
- First, select the cells in which data will be entered.
- Select Cells on the Format menu.
- Click on the Protection tab, and click on Locked
to remove the check mark.
- Select Protection on the Tools menu, and
click on Protect Sheet.
For additional information, click on the Office Assistant, type in
"protecting" then click on Search. The first article at
the top of the list is Control access to worksheets and
workbooks. Click once on it to open the article.
AutoFormat
The easiest way to format worksheets is to let Excel do it. The
AutoFormat feature offers a variety of built-in
formats.
- Select any cell or range you want to format, then click on
AutoFormat in the Format menu to open the
AutoFormat dialog box.
- To preview a format, click on its name in the left window. Click
on the Options... button to display a list of
elements that will be formatted.
- To see the effect of each option, click each one on or off. Make
sure that any elements that you don't want to apply don't have
a checkmark next to them. If you want to apply all elements to
your table, leave the checkmarks.
- Click on OK to return to your worksheet. The
formatting has been applied to your table. You can manually
change the formatting of any element.
In the past, if you wanted to format a range of entries just like an
existing row, it could be a bit tedious. Previous versions of the
Format Painter made it somewhat easier. In this version,
they added another of those wonderful 'bell and whistle' enhancements
that make me think they can read my mind!
In Excel 97, to copy all of the formatting from one range of data to
another range:
- Select all of the cells in the range whose formatting you want
to copy.
- click on the Format Painter button in the Standard
toolbar.
- Click once on the first cell of the range to be formatted, and
the cells are all formatted exactly like the cells in the
'source' range.
For example, you've created several tables in a worksheet. Each one
has headings in the first row, and each one includes cells in columns A
through G. You formatted the headings in the first table and want to
use the same formatting for all the tables in the worksheet.
Select cells A1-G1, then double-click on the Format
Painter button. Click once on cell A in the row you want to
format. The formatting will be applied to cells A-G in the row you
clicked in.
If you only want to copy formatting from one cell to another
(instead of from one range to another), click on the cell whose format
you want to copy, click on the Format Painter button,
then click on the cell you want to format.
To copy formatting from one cell or range to several cells or
ranges, double-click the Format Painter after selecting
the cell or range with the format you want to copy. This will allow you
to move through your worksheet and paste the format into as many cells
or ranges as you wish. When you're through, press the [Esc] key
to terminate the process.
Excel 97 also introduces a new feature that you can use to easily
track changes or trends in data. You can specify up to three conditions
and associate a different format with each condition. For example, you
can specify one format to be applied when a data item increases by a
certain percentage and another format if it decreases by a certain
percentage.
Here's how to do it:
- In a worksheet containing one or more cells of numeric
information, select the cell range (or an individual cell) to
which you want to apply conditional formatting.
- Select Conditional Formatting from the
Format menu.
- Under Condition 1, select either Cell Value Is or
Formula Is.
- From the second field, select an operator: less than, greater
than, between, etc. Enter a value in the third
field.
- Click on Format... to specify the format to use
when the condition is met.
- To add a second condition, click on Add >> and
repeat steps 3 and 4.
- Repeat for a third condition.
- Click on OK to close the window and view the
results of your conditional formatting.
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Cell Formats,
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Cell Formats,
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