Spreadsheet - Terms

Overview

The following section covers basic spreadsheet terms. Including;

[Spreadsheet terms]

Cell	Address, data types & pointer Characteristics - Contents, format & width Range - block
File	Table, Workarea, workbook Worksheet, Notebook Model
Calculations	Formulae Functions (@ function)
Formatting	Cell width, alignment, fonts, picture.

Cell

A Spreadsheet is made up of a grid of what are called CELLS. These cells divide the work area into regular ROWS and COLUMNS. Each individual ROW is referenced by a number starting with 1,2,3,... Columns are usually referenced by a letter, starting with A,B,C,..

The intersection of a row and column in a spreadsheet. The basic unit of a spreadsheet.

Cell Address

Each CELL can be uniquely referenced by a combination of its COLUMN letter and ROW number. This is known as the CELL ADDRESS.

Cell Data Types

LABEL alphanumeric, such as a description

VALUE - Numeric

FORMULA- A calculation or function using numbers and/or cell addresses and operators. A formula results in a VALUE.

Cell Pointer

Indicates the currently active cell

Cell characteristics

Cell characteristics include;

Contents

Format

Width

Range (or block)

A range can be any rectangular block of cells, or simply a single cell.
A range is defined by a starting cell address (Top left), and an ending cell address (Bottom right).
For example:. C7:F12 is a block of cells with corners at (C7,C12,F7 and F12)
May be specified as A1..C3 or A1:C3 depending on the spreadsheet.

Table and work area

TABLE	A group of cells which in combination perform a function
WORK AREA	The Area that spreadsheet TABLES occupy. This can be far larger than can be displayed on a single screen. The screen in effect moves over the top of a much larger work area, rather like a window.

Worksheet and work book (or notebook)

Worksheet

Data used by the spreadsheet program.

Notebook

A group of spreadsheets, combined in one file.

Model

Simulating a situation on a spreadsheet.

For example,

A business model may be used to do "what-if" analysis based on turnover.
A parking building model may be done to see whether it is viable to build one.

Calculations

Formula

A mathematical expression that performs a calculation based on values in a cell.

Includes;

operators such as; addition (+), subtraction (-), multiplication (*) division (/), and exponent (** or ^)
functions such as SUM
cell addresses; both relative and absolute.

Functions

Built in function, used in spreadsheet formulae, performing a calculation and returning a result.

For example @SUM(A1:A10) used by some spreadsheets to add up column A from row 1 to 10.

Functions exist for statistical, time and date, financial and logical operations.

@ - function

In LOTUS 1-2-3 (and others), functions are proceeded by an @ sign.
In MS-Excel (and others), functions may be typed in directly, or proceeded with an equal sign "=".

Formatting

It is important to make the distinction with the data the spreadsheet stores and the formatting applied to the data. So a date is often stored as the number of days since Jan 1 1900, whereas the format may take a variety of forms (eg. 31 November 1997, 31/11/1997, 31 Nov 1997, etc)

Cell width, alignment, text and number formats
Date and time formats