Formula autofill manipulation - excel

I am trying to create a large spreadsheet(10,000 rows of formulas) that takes information in from two other sheets. The basic layout that I want is:
Row1
=Sheet1!A7
=Sheet2!M7
=Sheet1!A8
=Sheet2!M8
=Sheet1!A9
=Sheet2!M9
...etc.
When I try to use to formula auto fill, excel picks up on the wrong pattern and I end up with something like this:
=Sheet1!A7
=Sheet2!M7
...
=Sheet1!A11
=Sheet2!M11
=Sheet1!A17
=Sheet2!M17
I gave excel 10 cells to base the pattern off of, and have not been able to get it to work. Can anyone help me figure out how to do this (hopefully without VBA)?

Try to avoid the volatile¹ OFFSET function or INDIRECT / ADDRESS function pairs in favor of the INDEX function and a little maths.
In the first two cells use these two formulas.
=INDEX(Sheet1!A:A, 7+ROW(1:1)/2)
=INDEX(Sheet2!M:M, 7+ROW(1:1)/2)
Select the two cells and drag the Fill Handle down.
¹ Volatile functions recalculate whenever anything in the entire workbook changes, not just when something that affects their outcome changes. Examples of volatile functions are INDIRECT, OFFSET, TODAY, NOW, RAND and RANDBETWEEN. Some sub-functions of the CELL and INFO worksheet functions will make them volatile as well.

Here is a simple VBA macro that sets up your links. Use it until a non-VBA solution is presented:
Sub propagator()
Dim i As Long, k As Long
k = 1
For i = 7 To 99
Cells(k, 1).Formula = "=Sheet1!A" & i
k = k + 1
Cells(k, 1).Formula = "=Sheet2!M" & i
k = k + 1
Next i
End Sub
Just select the destination worksheet and run the macro.
Adjust the 99 to meet your needs.

You can solve this without VBA with some =INDIRECT trickery -- the following is located in "Sheet3":
You can type out Sheet1!A and Sheet2!M in cells A1 and A2 respectively and fill down. Then, type a 7 in B1 and the formula in B2 -- again fill down. This first formula is effectively incrementing the count by two. Finally, you can type the formula in C1 and fill down.

Use the INDIRECT function to build this, and you can make the pattern work based on your current row number. Assuming your first cell is in Row 2:
=INDIRECT("Sheet1!A" & 7+(ROUNDDOWN(ROW()/2,0)-1))
=INDIRECT("Sheet2!M" & 7+(ROUNDDOWN(ROW()/2,0)-1))
ROW() returns the current row, which is then divided by 2 (since you only increase one row reference for every two cells), and then subtracted 1 (since we want the first adjustment to be 0).

Try in row 2:
=INDIRECT("Sheet1!A" & 7 +QUOTIENT(ROW()-2,2))
And in row 3:
=INDIRECT("Sheet2!M" & 7 +QUOTIENT(ROW()-2,2))
Highlight both and copy down.

Related

How can I substitute a cell reference for the formula the referred cell contains

How can I substitute a cell reference for the formula it contains, in other words, "expand" or "derivate" cell references?
An example, and I know I could calculate it using PV(): Suppose I want to calculate the present value of a given amount, reductor, number of periods and discount rate and in a spreadsheet I have:
A2: 1 (number of periods)
B2: 5000 (amount)
C2: 0,8 (reductor)
G1: 6% (discount rate)
If I want to calculate the final result on D2, I would have to enter:
=(B2*C2)*(1+$G$1)^(-A2)
(I intentionally used some unnecessary parentheses above)
But if I wanted, for debugging, or for building a more complex formula with more nested calculations write on cells:
D2: =E2*F2^G2
E2: =B2*C2
F2: =1+$G$1
G2: =-A2
So that I could check every part of the calculation is working ok and that the final formula is well "assembled" (or to easily correct what might be wrong or change it to calculate something else, like future value, for which I would remove the minus sign on G2).
And after doing those steps use some function/shortcut/feature on cell D2 that would replace
"=E2*F2^G2"
for
"=(B2*C2)*(1+$G$1)^(-A2)"
(i.e. do E2 → (B2*C2) F2 → (1+$G$1) and G2 → (-A2)) so that the desired formula is built on the right place and I can get rid of the temporary cells.
The closest to this behaviour I could find was formulatext() function, but it works just for a single reference and always include the "=" if I do, for instance
=CONCAT(FORMULATEXT(E2);"*";FORMULATEXT(F2);"^";FORMULATEXT(G2))
results in
=B2*C2*=1+$G$1^=-A2
which is not the desired result.
What I was expecting to find was something like when one select a part of a formula and presses F9 and it substitutes it for the value, but applied for functions or intermediate steps.
As it really does not seem to exist a built-in funcion on Excel, I came out with a script for doing this based on the answer on Parsing and extracting cell references from Excel formulas?
Works on Excel 365 (may work on other versions as well), replaces references on active cell only, does not work on cells that contain intervals (for instance, it will fail on a cell that contains =sum(A1:A5) ) and the contents of the precedent cells will end up enclosed in parentheses. It also does not replace "locked" cells (=$B$2 won't be replaced as well).
In summa, it is not perfect, maybe it's not ellegant too, but it seems to be as good as I needed and works on the proposed scope.
Sub ReplacePrecedents()
Dim r As Range, rr As Range
With ActiveCell.Range("A1")
' store the contents of the cell
parsedcontents = .Formula
Set r = .DirectPrecedents
' iterate throughout all precedents
For Each rr In r
' store each one between parentheses
appendstr = "("
' check whether first character is a "=" or a value
If StrComp(Left(rr.Range("A1").Formula, 1), "=") = 0 Then
appendstr = appendstr & Right(rr.Range("A1").Formula, Len(rr.Range("A1").Formula) - 1)
Else
appendstr = appendstr & rr.Range("A1").Formula
End If
appendstr = appendstr & ")"
' do the magic
parsedcontents = Replace(parsedcontents, rr.Address(0, 0), appendstr)
Next rr
' write the parsed string to the cell
.Formula = parsedcontents
End With
End Sub
Thank you for everyone that replied, I guess I still do not have privileges enough to upvote a comment, as soon as I do, I will.

combine all cells, numbers and symbols to a sum

Good day,
I'm at a loss on this problem.
I have a group of cells that contain words, like apple, this word would be the value. It is separated by a symbol for completing the math. They can be changed by the user to make custom calculations.
Cell A1 is "apple", B1 is "+", cell C1 is "apple", cell D1 is "*", cell E1 is "apple", call F1 is "=" and cell G1 is the suggested total, in this case would be "6".
It would be posted as | apple | + | apple | * | apple | = | 6 |
The legend holds the value for the word, so if you enter 2 in the legend, apple would be 2.
The logic would determine that the formula would be 2+2*2= if written in excel, I would like to combine all the cells and calculate this.
I tried using =sum, sumproduct, concate and the like to no avail.
Any head way I did make, I ended up getting BEDMAS wrong as it calculated it as 2+2=4*2=8, instead of the correct 2*2=4+2=6.
Anyone know of a way to combine these cells and properly sum the values to the correct total?
Thank you for your time!
Go to the Name manager and create named range Eval, into Refers to field add formula:
=EVALUATE(CONCATENATE(VLOOKUP(Sheet1!A1,Sheet1!$A$3:$B$5,2,0),Sheet1!B1,VLOOKUP(Sheet1!C1,Sheet1!$A$3:$B$5,2,0),Sheet1!D1,VLOOKUP(Sheet1!E1,Sheet1!$A$3:$B$5,2,0)))
In range A3:B5 I have legend.
Change references as you need. Then in cell G1 write formula =Eval.
Sample:
This is a UDF based solution. Its advantage is that it's more versatile and by far easier to maintain if you learn its elements of code. The disadvantage is in that you do have to learn the elements of code and you have an xlsm macro-enabled workbook which isn't welcome everywhere.
The setup is simple. I created a table with columns Item and Value. I placed it on another sheet than the task. In fact, you could make the sheet with the table VeryHidden so that the user can't look at it without access to the VBA project, which you can password protect. I called the table Legend. The item columns has names like apple, pear, orange. The Value column has the numeric values associated with each name.
Note that, since this is a VBA project, the entire list can be transferred to VBA leaving no trace on the sheet. You could have a function to display the value of each item as the user clicks on it and have it disappear as he clicks elsewhere.
Next I created a data validation drop-down in A1 with the List defined as =INDIRECT("Legend[Item]"). Copy this cell to C1 and E1.
Then I created another Data Validation drop-down in B1 with the list as +,-,*,/. This drop-down must be copied to D1.
Now the code below goes into a standard code module. Find the way to create it because it isn't any of those Excel sets up automatically. It's default name would be Module1. Paste the code there.
Function Evalue(Definition As Range) As Double
Dim Task As String
Dim Fact(2) As Double
Dim C As Long
Dim i As Long
With Definition
For C = 1 To 5 Step 2
On Error Resume Next
Fact(i) = Application.VLookup(.Cells(C).Value, Range("Legend"), 2, False)
i = i + 1
Next C
Task = "(" & Fact(0) & .Cells(2).Value _
& Fact(1) & ")" & .Cells(4).Value _
& Fact(2)
End With
Evalue = Evaluate(Task)
End Function
Now you are ready for testing. Call the function from the worksheet with a call like
=Evalue(A1:E1). You can use it in comparisons like =IF(G6 = Evalue(A1:E1), "Baravo!", "Try again"). As you change any of the components the cell with the function will change.
Remember to use absolute addressing if you copy formulas containing the range. If you need to get a result in VBA while testing, use this sub to call the function.
Private Sub TestEvalue()
Debug.Print Evalue(Range("A1:E1"))
End Sub
My Sheet
Here is what I have.
In cells M - U, i count all the instances of the word from cells E, G and I from the legend.
=SUMPRODUCT((LEN(E3)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(E3,$B$3,"")))/LEN($B$3))
In cells W - AE, I multiply the instances with the value to give me a total each time the word appears.
=SUM(M3*$C$3)
In cell E8 - I8, i add the three possible values together.
=SUM(W3:Y3) so each worded cell is now a number.
I'd like to take the cells E8 - I8 to make a calculation in k8 and so on.
So, each cell is put together to make an
=SUM(E8:I8)
statement, which all works except E11 - I11 which equates to 26 instead of 43.

How to insert the values of a function every nth row

I have a function in Excel that calculates the average of some numbers
=AVERAGE(I1:I36) for example.
The thing is, I need to paste this function every 49 rows, instead of counting the rows manually then copying and pasting.
To do this in VBA (avoiding blank formulae) you could try this:
Enters formulas from A1 to A50000 every 9 rows
Dim rng1 As Range
Set rng1 = Range([a1], Cells(50000, "A"))
rng1.FormulaR1C1 = Application.Evaluate("=IF(MOD(ROW(A1:A50000),49)=0,""=AVERAGE(RC9:R[35]C9)"","""")")
=IF(MOD(ROW(),49)=0,AVERAGE($I$1:$I$36),"")
If you save in c1 the starting row and in c2 the frequency of the formula, it should look like
=IF(MOD(ROW()-$c$1+$c$2,$c$2)=0,AVERAGE($I$1:$I$36),"")
Decision 1
Use =IF(MOD((ROW()-ROW($I$1)),49)=0;AVERAGE(I1:I36);"")
Pro: pure formula, without macros.
Cons: you have to use entire column for it, excessive calculations (btw ROW() function is not efficient, so it would be better to spend another column for row number).
Decision 2
Just select cell with a formula and 48 empty cells, press "Copy", then select entire range and press "Paste".

Randomly fill in a table of 25 values, that come from a set of 30 values?

I want to make a series of tables that each contain 25 values, that come from a set of 30 values. How can I quickly, and randomly, produce these tables? I'm wondering if there is a way in excel, or will I need to program something, myself? If so, which language would be the easiest (Python, C, Java)?
Edit: The 25 values would include no repeats. In other words, I'm looking for random combinations (30C25) of the values.
You can eventually add the following custom User-Defined function and then use it as an array formula. Add the code to code module Module1:
Public Function RandUnique(src As Range) As Variant
Dim v As Variant: v = src
Randomize
Dim i As Integer, j As Integer, temp As Variant
For i = 1 To src.Rows.count
j = 1 + Int(Rnd * src.Rows.count)
temp = v(i, 1): v(i, 1) = v(j, 1): v(j, 1) = temp
Next
RandUnique = v
End Function
Once you have added this UDF,
Select the destination range, enter in the formula bar the following formula
=RandUnique($A$1:$A$30) ' <~~ set it to your source range of 30 values
Then press Ctrl+Shift+Enter
Please note that the randomization procedure used is rather basic, so that not all the combinations have really equal probability, but it is fair enough, unless you are using it for some deep statistical analysis, in which case you might need a perfect randomizer.
Name a list of your thirty values in Excel in rows greater than 25 (say List30), then in A1 copied down to A25 and all copied across to suit:
=INDEX(List30,RANDBETWEEN(1,30))
To exclude repetitions (so not random choices) you might enter your list in A1:A30 and in B1 copied down to suit:
=RAND()
then sort A:B on ColumnB and copy A1:A25 to paste say to D1. This way only one set is generated at a time (the sort/copy/paste would have to be repeated after each paste).
Here is an interesting way that requires no VBA nor any manual sorting.
Enter your source list in the range A1:A30.
In cell B1 enter this formula:
=CHOOSE(RANDBETWEEN(1,7),7,11,13,17,19,23,29)
In the range C1:C30 enter this formula:
=INDEX(A$1:A$30,MOD(ROWS(A$1:J1)*B$1,30))
In cell D1 enter this formula:
=RANDBETWEEN(1,30)
Now select any 25 contiguous vertical and empty cells and enter this formula:
=INDEX($C$1:$C$30,MOD(D$1+ROWS($A$1:$J1),30)+1)
Now copy the 25 cells and paste as values somewhere for your 1st table. Press F9 on the keyboard to get a fresh 25; copy and paste as values somewhere for your 2nd table. Press F9 on the keyboard to get a fresh 25; copy and paste as values somewhere for your 3rd table. Keep repeating for as many tables as you need.
.
Please note that while this will look very random (with no repeats) it is not random at all. It's a complex interference pattern that will appear completely random unless you are the Rain Man.

Applying a formula to a group of cells

I'm trying to do a formula where it is CELL / 127.05 - 1 and apply this to columns H-Y and rows 2-455. I'm not really familiar with excel and am going about this calculation cell by cell. Also, I'm running into a "circular" problem where certain cells rely on another, if anyone could explain this.
Thanks ahead of time!
A formula in a cell generally cannot refer to itself. If you want to apply an operation to an existing range of data, you can, but it is quite rare and surely not in the spirit of a spreadsheet app.
Regarding your question, you could
- enter a value (127.05) anywhere in an empty cell,
- then copy that cell
- then select the range you want to modify
- then select Paste Special / Divide (or any other operation)
As I said above, it sounds like you want to apply that formula to same cell that contains the value you want to act on. That will not work. results cells (i.e. containing your conclusions) will contain the formula and a reference to the cell it will act on. (Although I am using a smaller area for illustration, the principles will apply to your specific application)
Note - I used the randbetween(min,max) function to populate all the data cells. this is why each image contains different data. You of course will use cells containing static data.
For a simple example:
Say you put the value 127.05 in cell A1, and have a range of data cells, like this:
In cell F1, enter = b1/$a$1 - 1 like this:
Note, the $ signs tell Excel to use a static location cell reference. After hitting enter, the value -0.85045 will appear. Now, click and hold your mouse starting in that cell, and drag your mouse down to row 14 release the mouse button and hit keys <ctrl><d>. Your sheet should look like this:
Hold down the shift key while the column is still selected, and hit the right arrow key 3 times, Your sheet should look like this:
release the shift key and while the cells are all highlighted, hit keys <ctrl><r>. The results are here:
One way is to highlight the column (or specific range) you want to apply the formula to, press F2 to access the formula bar, type the formula, and press CTRL+D to paste DOWN if the range is vertical and CTRL+R to paste ACROSS if the range is horizontal. Say that your data looks like this:
A B
--- ---
5 A1/127-1
4
7
8
Then in order to copy the formula down, highlight A2 to A4 and press CTRL+D, or highlight B1, and click on the bottom right of the box that comes up surrounding the cell.
If you wanted to simply replace the values in A with their formula values you would still have to use Column B as a 'helper' column, rather than entering the value right into the cell. This is in fact exactly what is giving you the circular reference error.
Regarding the circular error, you may be trying to apply the formula to the cell you are already in. For example, if you are trying to apply the formula A1 / 127 - 1 in the cell A1 Excel won't know what to do because you have specified that the value of A1 is both the value in the specified cell and another value ( A1 / 127 - 1), which can't be true.
Now, the only way I know of to do what you're requesting is with VBA, because I realized just now that I asked a very similar question a while ago which was helpfully answered by Gary. The code was as follows:
Sub Formulate()
Dim N As Long, i As Long, dq As String
N = Cells(Rows.Count, "A").End(xlUp).Row
dq = Chr(34)
For i = 1 To N
v = Cells(i, 1).Value
Cells(i, 1).Formula = "=Text(" & v & "," & dq & "mm/dd/yyyy" & dq & ")"
Next i
End Sub

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