How to use "or" in Excel Solver constraint - excel

I am adding a constraint to Excel Solver.
The constraint is saying an input data at location A3 must be either 0 or between 3 and 8.
How could I add this constraint in Excel Solver since I could not find 'or' function in solver constraint box. It only has ">=", "<=", "=", "int", "bin", "dif" operators there.
Many Thanks

This is a little bit of a hack, but you could create a function that is zero when your constraints are met, and nonzero when they are not. For example, if you have (in named ranges) a number of individual values val_1, val_2 etc. that are all valid, and a range llim and ulim (lower and upper limit), then the following equation will evaluate to zero if your conditions are met:
=(A3 - val_1) * (A3 - val_2) * FLOOR.PRECISE(ABS((A3 - (llim + ulim) / 2) / ((ulim - llim) / 2)))
When cell A3 is either val_1 or val_2, you will multiply your expression by zero; and when A3 is between llim and ulim, the expression inside the FLOOR.PRECISE() function will evaluate to something smaller than 1 - so the FLOOR will be zero.
Enter that expression in a cell, and make your constraint that this cell must be zero... It ought to work. It did for me - with the function to optimize being "3 * A3", and limits set to 3 and 8, the solution was 7.99999.
Note - one problem with this is that you will most likely get the solver "stuck" in just one interval - it will never notice the other possible values. If that is important, you may have to come up with a transformation of a continuous variable into one that has discrete values plus a range. Example:
=IF(A3<-1,val_1,IF(A3<0,val_2,llim+(ulim-llim)*ATAN(A3)*2/PI()))
Now A3 can vary over the full range, and yet the cell with this formula in it will always have a "valid" value in it. Again, if you need more fixed values you can add more nested IF statements...

It is used for the purpose where the situation is if one condition is also correct then it should show true.

Related

How to get equal results when doing arithmetic operations vba/excel [Double variable precision]

I am trying to get equal result of two exact calculations which are computed in a cell formula and the other one with a UDF:
Function calc()
Dim num as Double
num = 30000000 * ((1 + 8 / 100 / 365) ^ 125)
calc = num
End Function
Result of the calculation is different
A1 = 30000000 * ((1 + 8 / 100 / 365) ^ 125) not equal to A2 = calc()
We can test it with =if(A1=A2, TRUE, FALSE) which is false. I do understand that it has something to do with data types in vba and executing cell formula. Do you know how to make calculations to from vba function(s) and excel cell field(s) to render same result?
So, the calculation in application excel and the calculation in vba are presenting different outputs (what you've presented, with format displaying 20 decimal places):
As such, you would see false when comparing them. You will need to round() or format() to truncate the calculation at a level that is appropriate. E.g.:
calc = round(num,4)
calc = format(num,"0.###0")
The reason this is occurring is because of the inherent math you're using, specifically, ((1 + 8 / 100 / 365) ^ 125), and how that is being truncated/rounded in the allocated memory to each part of the calculation, which differs in VBA and in-application Excel.
Edit: Final image with the VBA changes I'd suggested:
Explanation
Double Data type seems to have flaws being "precise" after the "nth" digit. This is stated as well in the documentation
Precision. When you work with floating-point numbers, remember that they do not always have a precise representation in memory. This could lead to unexpected results from certain operations, such as value comparison and the Mod operator.
Troubleshooting
It seems that is the case here: I set up the value from the division on a cell and the division as formula in another one, although excel interface says there are not differences, when computing that value again, the formula on the sheet seems to be more precise.
Actual result
Further thoughts
It seems that is limited by the data type itself, if precision is not an issue, you may try to round it. If it is critical to be as precise as possible, I would suggest you to connect with an API to something that is able to handle more precision. In this scenario, I would use xlwings to use python.

Excel comparison with multiple IFs

I have a scale, based on which I decide the value of the coefficient for the multiplication. The scale looks as following:
Which means that:
for Category1: when value>=1.000.000 then coef is 1, when value>=500.000 then coef is 0.8 and etc.
Same logic applies for Category2;
Then I have input data in the following format:
Company !MainCat|Sales Amount|
Company1|T1 | 6.500.000|
Company2|T2 | 70.000|
I need to find corresponding coefficient, ratio of the coeffitient and the value (=ratio*MaxCoef). Currently, I am finding coef the following way:
- for company1:
=IF(C8>=$D2;$D$1;IF(C8>=$E2;$E$1;IF(C8>=$F2;$F$1;IF(C8>=$G2;$G$1;IF(C8>=$H2;$H$1;IF(C8>=$I2;$I$1))))))
That is literally hardcoded and doesn't look good. Maybe there is a better way of doing ? Any suggestions?
Formula view:
You can COUNTIF(range, [criteria] < value) * 0.2 as your add 0.2 per coef stage.
To you data do: =COUNTIF(D2:H2, "<"&C8) * 0.2, count how many stages the value passes * the value per stage.
Your count if range needs to be until H2 as I2 is 0, so inferior to value and gets counted.
To combine the COUNTIF() with a dynamic search for the right category based on MainCat you can MATCH() the MainCat with Code which will give the row where the Code is located and utilize INDIRECT() to apply it as range.
=COUNTIF(INDIRECT("D"&MATCH(B8,B:B,0)&":H"&MATCH(B8,B:B,0)),"<"&C8)*0.2
MATCH(B8,B:B,0) - will match the value on B8 (lets say T1) and return the row 2.
INDIRECT("D"&MATCH(B8,B:B,0)&":H"&MATCH(B8,B:B,0) = INDIRECT("D"&2&":H"&2) - will turn the text into an actual range to be use by the COUNTIF().
Create a table ‚Mapping’ that contains two columns, ‚Category’ and ‚Coefficient‘, then use INDEX-MATCH on it as described in https://www.deskbright.com/excel/using-index-match/.
=INDEX(Mapping[Category]; MATCH([Coefficient]; Mapping[Coefficient]; -1))
This example assumes that you put this formula into a table that has a column named ‚Coefficient‘ with the input value to your multiple IFs.
The trick is that as a match_type argument, provide either -1 or 1, according to your needs.
You can do this in VBA. Write your own function which ends in something like that
=MyOwnScale(C8; B8; A2:I3)
The first parameter of your VBA-function is the value, the second the category and the third is the range with the thresholds. So you can move your cascading IF-loops in VBA-Code and you (and your users) see only a clean function call in the cell.

How to exclude zero entry from a dynamic formula (SUBTOTAL + SUMPRODUCT) in excel

I'm working on a formula to get the standard deviation. It has been working not until I encountered a zero value which makes the result into #DIV/0!.
This is the screenshot of the expected value.
However, when I used my formula, the Game Time SD returned 0.
How do I exclude it in the calculation if the value in F column is zero? I tried IF(F5:F9 <> 0) but it won't work.
This is the formula I used.
F3 = IFERROR(SUBTOTAL(1,F5:F9),0)
G3 = IFERROR(SUMPRODUCT(SUBTOTAL(2,OFFSET(F5:F9,ROW(F5:F9)-MIN(ROW(F5:F9)),,1))*(G5:G9*F5:F9))/SUBTOTAL(9,F5:F9),0)
H3 = IFERROR(((SUBTOTAL(9,F5:F9)*(SUMPRODUCT(SUBTOTAL(2,OFFSET(F5:F9,ROW(F5:F9)-MIN(ROW(F5:F9)),,1)) *
((H5:H9^2*F5:F9*(F5:F9-1)+(G5:G9*F5:F9)^2)/F5:F9)))-(SUMPRODUCT(SUBTOTAL(9,OFFSET(G5:G9,ROW(G5:G9)-MIN(ROW(G5:G9)),,1)),SUBTOTAL(9,OFFSET(F5:F9,ROW(F5:F9)-MIN(ROW(F5:F9)),,1))))^2)/(SUBTOTAL(9,F5:F9)*(SUBTOTAL(9,F5:F9)-1)))^(1/2),0)
I know the problem is somewhere in F5:F9, since the divisor used is zero
The part you suspected in the code involves dividing by a denominator that happens to be a factor in the numerator. You can avoid a division by zero by simplifying that fraction.
((H5:H9^2*F5:F9*(F5:F9-1)+(G5:G9*F5:F9)^2)/F5:F9)))
can be reduced to
(H5:H9^2*(F5:F9-1) + (G5:G9^2*F5:F9))
Resulting in the formula (3rd line modified)
=IFERROR(((SUBTOTAL(9,F5:F9)*
(SUMPRODUCT(SUBTOTAL(2,OFFSET(F5:F9,ROW(F5:F9)-MIN(ROW(F5:F9)),,1))*
(H5:H9^2*(F5:F9-1) + (G5:G9^2*F5:F9))))-
(SUMPRODUCT(SUBTOTAL(9,OFFSET(G5:G9,ROW(G5:G9)-
MIN(ROW(G5:G9)),,1)),SUBTOTAL(9,OFFSET(F5:F9,ROW(F5:F9)-
MIN(ROW(F5:F9)),,1))))^2)/(SUBTOTAL(9,F5:F9)*
(SUBTOTAL(9,F5:F9)-1)))^(1/2), 0)
In my tests without the enclosing IFERROR, I could set some rows to zero and get values. Only when the square rooted subtotal was negative (which logically should not happen) was the result #NUM.
Hope this helps.

Round to nearest integer non-zero

I am looking to come up with a crafty and "nice-looking" way of rounding to the nearest NON-ZERO whole number (I will only ever have positive integers). Three restraints I have are:
Must be a non-UDF solution as I will have some users who will want to trace formulas. Even though a VBA solution will result in a cleaner entry in the formula bar, they are not easily traceable by "front-end" users.
Some of the cells I am looking to round are quite long formulas themselves.
Think something like =(SUMPRODUCT((A1:A20),(B1:B20)) / SUMPRODUCT((A21:A40),(B21:B40))) - (SUMPRODUCT((A41:A60),(B41:B60)) * SUMPRODUCT((A61:A80),(B61:B80))) + SUMPRODUCT((A81:A100),(B81:B100))
I am unable to round the values in A1:B100 to make it whole numbers to begin with.
I am unable to use the cells with my formulas as a reference due to how the sheet must be styled for users. (e.g. I can only have one column of visible cells with my results. Therefore, if I used the formula cells as a reference, the formula cells would have to be hidden. This breaks restraint #1 because users would have difficulty with formula tracing.) This restraint is described in more detail below.
The most succinct formula I can think of is thus:
=IF(AND(C1 > 0, C1 < 1), ROUNDUP(C1, 0), ROUND(C1, 0))
Due to #3, I cannot use C1 as a reference. So my end result would be more like:
=IF(AND((SUMPRODUCT((A1:A20),(B1:B20)) / SUMPRODUCT((A21:A40),(B21:B40))) - (SUMPRODUCT((A41:A60),(B41:B60)) * SUMPRODUCT((A61:A80),(B61:B80))) + SUMPRODUCT((A81:A100),(B81:B100)) > 0, (SUMPRODUCT((A1:A20),(B1:B20)) / SUMPRODUCT((A21:A40),(B21:B40))) - (SUMPRODUCT((A41:A60),(B41:B60)) * SUMPRODUCT((A61:A80),(B61:B80))) + SUMPRODUCT((A81:A100),(B81:B100)) < 1), ROUNDUP((SUMPRODUCT((A1:A20),(B1:B20)) / SUMPRODUCT((A21:A40),(B21:B40))) - (SUMPRODUCT((A41:A60),(B41:B60)) * SUMPRODUCT((A61:A80),(B61:B80))) + SUMPRODUCT((A81:A100),(B81:B100)), 0), ROUND((SUMPRODUCT((A1:A20),(B1:B20)) / SUMPRODUCT((A21:A40),(B21:B40))) - (SUMPRODUCT((A41:A60),(B41:B60)) * SUMPRODUCT((A61:A80),(B61:B80))) + SUMPRODUCT((A81:A100),(B81:B100)), 0))
Not very "nice-looking".
Any recommendations?
EDIT Overly complex formulas removed
Another, simpler option
=MAX(1,ROUND(your_formula,0))
My formula assumes that your_formula will only return a positive value. If that is not the case, please clarify what results you expect for zero or negative results.
EDIT
With regard to possible zero values, try this. I cannot test it since I am not at computer:
=--(TEXT(your_formula, "[>1]0;[>0]1;0"))
Except for negatives (of which there aren't any) this formula:
=(C1<>0)*IF(C1<1,1,ROUND(C1,0))
produces the same results as:
=IF(AND(C1>0,C1<1),ROUNDUP(C1,0),ROUND(C1,0))
and is 15 characters shorter.
It deals with 0 with (C1<>0) by returning FALSE when C1 is zero, which the * effectively converts to 0. Otherwise TRUE and then by multiplying by 1 instead of 0 it does not affect the result of the rest of the formula.
The IF statement then tests whether or not C1 is less than 1. If so, returns 1 and otherwise applies standard rounding (to integers).
The formula might be shortened if the output range were formatted with Cells Format but otherwise anything more succinct is quite likely to be less intelligible - and may be more a matter for Programming Puzzles & Code Golf than SO.
Though:
=--(TEXT(C1,"[>1]0;[>0]1;0"))
is indeed 4 characters shorter still.

Case Function Equivalent in Excel

I have an interesting challenge - I need to run a check on the following data in Excel:
| A - B - C - D |
|------|------|------|------|
| 36 | 0 | 0 | x |
| 0 | 600 | 700 | x |
|___________________________|
You'll have to excuse my wonderfully bad ASCII art. So I need the D column (x) to run a check against the adjacent cells, then convert the values if necessary. Here's the criteria:
If column B is greater than 0, everything works great and I can get coffee. If it doesn't meet that requirement, then I need to convert A1 according to a table - for example, 32 = 1420 and place into D. Unfortunately, there is no relationship between A and what it needs to convert to, so creating a calculation is out of the question.
A case or switch statement would be perfect in this scenario, but I don't think it is a native function in Excel. I also think it would be kind of crazy to chain a bunch of =IF() statements together, which I did about four times before deciding it was a bad idea (story of my life).
Sounds like a job for VLOOKUP!
You can put your 32 -> 1420 type mappings in a couple of columns somewhere, then use the VLOOKUP function to perform the lookup.
Without reference to the original problem (which I suspect is long since solved), I very recently discovered a neat trick that makes the Choose function work exactly like a select case statement without any need to modify data. There's only one catch: only one of your choose conditions can be true at any one time.
The syntax is as follows:
CHOOSE(
(1 * (CONDITION_1)) + (2 * (CONDITION_2)) + ... + (N * (CONDITION_N)),
RESULT_1, RESULT_2, ... , RESULT_N
)
On the assumption that only one of the conditions 1 to N will be true, everything else is 0, meaning the numeric value will correspond to the appropriate result.
If you are not 100% certain that all conditions are mutually exclusive, you might prefer something like:
CHOOSE(
(1 * TEST1) + (2 * TEST2) + (4 * TEST3) + (8 * TEST4) ... (2^N * TESTN)
OUT1, OUT2, , OUT3, , , , OUT4 , , <LOTS OF COMMAS> , OUT5
)
That said, if Excel has an upper limit on the number of arguments a function can take, you'd hit it pretty quickly.
Honestly, can't believe it's taken me years to work it out, but I haven't seen it before, so figured I'd leave it here to help others.
EDIT: Per comment below from #aTrusty:
Silly numbers of commas can be eliminated (and as a result, the choose statement would work for up to 254 cases) by using a formula of the following form:
CHOOSE(
1 + LOG(1 + (2*TEST1) + (4*TEST2) + (8*TEST3) + (16*TEST4),2),
OTHERWISE, RESULT1, RESULT2, RESULT3, RESULT4
)
Note the second argument to the LOG clause, which puts it in base 2 and makes the whole thing work.
Edit: Per David's answer, there's now an actual switch statement if you're lucky enough to be working on office 2016. Aside from difficulty in reading, this also means you get the efficiency of switch, not just the behaviour!
The Switch function is now available, in Excel 2016 / Office 365
SWITCH(expression, value1, result1, [default or value2, result2],…[default or value3, result3])
example:
=SWITCH(A1,0,"FALSE",-1,"TRUE","Maybe")
Microsoft -Office Support
Note: MS has updated that page to only document the behavior of Excel 2019. Eventually, they will probably remove references to 2019 as well... To see what the page looked like in 2016, use the wayback machine:
https://web.archive.org/web/20161010180642/https://support.office.com/en-us/article/SWITCH-function-47ab33c0-28ce-4530-8a45-d532ec4aa25e
Try this;
=IF(B1>=0, B1, OFFSET($X$1, MATCH(B1, $X:$X, Z) - 1, Y)
WHERE
X = The columns you are indexing into
Y = The number of columns to the left (-Y) or right (Y) of the indexed column to get the value you are looking for
Z = 0 if exact-match (if you want to handle errors)
I used this solution to convert single letter color codes into their descriptions:
=CHOOSE(FIND(H5,"GYR"),"Good","OK","Bad")
You basically look up the element you're trying to decode in the array, then use CHOOSE() to pick the associated item. It's a little more compact than building a table for VLOOKUP().
I know it a little late to answer but I think this short video will help you a lot.
http://www.xlninja.com/2012/07/25/excel-choose-function-explained/
Essentially it is using the choose function. He explains it very well in the video so I'll let do it instead of typing 20 pages.
Another video of his explains how to use data validation to populate a drop down which you can select from a limited range.
http://www.xlninja.com/2012/08/13/excel-data-validation-using-dependent-lists/
You could combine the two and use the value in the drop down as your index to the choose function. While he did not show how to combine them, I'm sure you could figure it out as his videos are good. If you have trouble, let me know and I'll update my answer to show you.
I understand that this is a response to an old post-
I like the If() function combined with Index()/Match():
=IF(B2>0,"x",INDEX($H$2:$I$9,MATCH(A2,$H$2:$H$9,0),2))
The if function compare what is in column b and if it is greater than 0, it returns x, if not it uses the array (table of information) identified by the Index() function and selected by Match() to return the value that a corresponds to.
The Index array has the absolute location set $H$2:$I$9 (the dollar signs) so that the place it points to will not change as the formula is copied. The row with the value that you want returned is identified by the Match() function. Match() has the added value of not needing a sorted list to look through that Vlookup() requires. Match() can find the value with a value: 1 less than, 0 exact, -1 greater than. I put a zero in after the absolute Match() array $H$2:$H$9 to find the exact match. For the column that value of the Index() array that one would like returned is entered. I entered a 2 because in my array the return value was in the second column. Below my index array looked like this:
32 1420
36 1650
40 1790
44 1860
55 2010
The value in your 'a' column to search for in the list is in the first column in my example and the corresponding value that is to be return is to the right. The look up/reference table can be on any tab in the work book - or even in another file. -Book2 is the file name, and Sheet2 is the 'other tab' name.
=IF(B2>0,"x",INDEX([Book2]Sheet2!$A$1:$B$8,MATCH(A2,[Book2]Sheet2!$A$1:$A$8,0),2))
If you do not want x return when the value of b is greater than zero delete the x for a 'blank'/null equivalent or maybe put a 0 - not sure what you would want there.
Below is beginning of the function with the x deleted.
=IF(B2>0,"",INDEX...
If you don't have a SWITCH statement in your Excel version (pre-Excel-2016), here's a VBA implementation for it:
Public Function SWITCH(ParamArray args() As Variant) As Variant
Dim i As Integer
Dim val As Variant
Dim tmp As Variant
If ((UBound(args) - LBound(args)) = 0) Or (((UBound(args) - LBound(args)) Mod 2 = 0)) Then
Error 450 'Invalid arguments
Else
val = args(LBound(args))
i = LBound(args) + 1
tmp = args(UBound(args))
While (i < UBound(args))
If val = args(i) Then
tmp = args(i + 1)
End If
i = i + 2
Wend
End If
SWITCH = tmp
End Function
It works exactly like expected, a drop-in replacement for example for Google Spreadsheet's SWITCH function.
Syntax:
=SWITCH(selector; [keyN; valueN;] ... defaultvalue)
where
selector is any expression that is compared to keys
key1, key2, ... are expressions that are compared to the selector
value1, value2, ... are values that are selected if the selector equals to the corresponding key (only)
defaultvalue is used if no key matches the selector
Examples:
=SWITCH("a";"?") returns "?"
=SWITCH("a";"a";"1";"?") returns "1"
=SWITCH("x";"a";"1";"?") returns "?"
=SWITCH("b";"a";"1";"b";TRUE;"?") returns TRUE
=SWITCH(7;7;1;7;2;0) returns 2
=SWITCH("a";"a";"1") returns #VALUE!
To use it, open your Excel, go to Develpment tools tab, click Visual Basic, rightclick on ThisWorkbook, choose Insert, then Module, finally copy the code into the editor. You have to save as a macro-friendly Excel workbook (xlsm).
Even if old, this seems to be a popular questions, so I'll post another solution, which I think is very elegant:
http://fiveminutelessons.com/learn-microsoft-excel/using-multiple-if-statements-excel
It's elegant because it uses just the IF function. Basically, it boils down to this:
if(condition, choose/use a value from the table, if(condition, choose/use another value from the table...
And so on
Works beautifully, even better than HLOOKUP or VLOOOKUP
but... Be warned - there is a limit to the number of nested if statements excel can handle.
Microsoft replace SWITCH, IFS and IFVALUES with CHOOSE only function.
=CHOOSE($L$1,"index_1","Index_2","Index_3")
Recently I unfortunately had to work with Excel 2010 again for a while and I missed the SWITCH function a lot. I came up with the following to try to minimize my pain:
=CHOOSE(SUM((A1={"a";"b";"c"})*ROW(INDIRECT(1&":"&3))),1,2,3)
CTRL+SHIFT+ENTER
where A1 is where your condition lies (it could be a formula, whatever). The good thing is that we just have to provide the condition once (just like SWITCH) and the cases (in this example: a,b,c) and results (in this example: 1,2,3) are ordered, which makes it easy to reason about.
Here is how it works:
Cond={"c1";"c2";...;"cn"} returns a N-vector of TRUE or FALSE (with behaves like 1s and 0s)
ROW(INDIRECT(1&":"&n)) returns a N-vector of ordered numbers: 1;2;3;...;n
The multiplication of both vectors will return lots of zeros and a number (position) where the condition was matched
SUM just transforms this vector with zeros and a position into just a single number, which CHOOSE then can use
If you want to add another condition, just remember to increment the last number inside INDIRECT
If you want an ELSE case, just wrap it inside an IFERROR formula
The formula will not behave properly if you provide the same condition more than once, but I guess nobody would want to do that anyway
If your using Office 2016 or later, or Office 365, there is a new function that acts similarly to a CASE function called IFS. Here's the description of the function from Microsoft's documentation:
The IFS function checks whether one or more conditions are met, and returns a value that corresponds to the first TRUE condition. IFS can take the place of multiple nested IF statements, and is much easier to read with multiple conditions.
An example of usage follows:
=IFS(A2>89,"A",A2>79,"B",A2>69,"C",A2>59,"D",TRUE,"F")
You can even specify a default result:
To specify a default result, enter TRUE for your final logical_test argument. If none of the other conditions are met, the corresponding value will be returned.
The default result feature is included in the example shown above.
You can read more about it on Microsoft's Support Documentation

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