I have an excel formula that I need to put into an MS-Access query. Unfortunately, an Arc Cosine function does not seem to be part of Access's repertoire. So in Excel, part of the formula is ACOS(Lots of stuff). So my question is how can I achieve an ACOS() Excelfunction in MS-Access?
Note: In case anyone is wondering or in case it actually matters for some odd reason, here is the full equation as it appears in Excel:
=(ACOS(SIN(RADIANS(AX2))*SIN(RADIANS(AZ2))+COS(RADIANS(AX2))*COS(RADIANS(AZ2))*COS(RADIANS(AY2)-RADIANS(BA2)))*6367)*0.621
Columns AX and AZ hold latitudes and AY and BA hold longitudes and this equation gets the distance in miles between the two points. And before anyone brings it up I am aware that Access doesn't have Radians function. I have already replaced it with an equivalent operation. I of course have changed the column references from Excel to the appropriate Access field references.
I have found two ways to do this. The first, and the one I used, is to use an equivalent trig identity for the ACOS() function:
Arccos(X) = Atn(-X / Sqr(-X * X + 1)) + 2 * Atn(1)
This results in a rather long equation for me but it works and does not appear take very long to run. The other solution I have read about (but not tested) is to create a
reference to the Microsoft Excel Object Library (Tools | References on
the VBA menu bar). This exposes the Excel worksheet functions, which
you can reference with:
Excel.WorksheetFunction.ACOS(TheNumberGoesHere)
Related
Alright this should be a simple one.
I apologize in case it has been already solved, but I can only find posts related to solving this issue with programming languages and not specifically to EXCEL.
Furthermore, I could find posts that address a sub-problem of my question (e.g. regarding limitation of certain EXCEL functions) and should solve/invalidate my request but maybe, just maybe, there is a workaround.
Problem statement:
I want to calculate the minimum value for each column in an EXCEL matrix. Simply enough, I want to input a 2D array (mxn matrix) in a function and output an array with dimension 1xm where each item is the minimum value MIN(nj) of each nj column.
However, I want to solve this with specific constraints:
Avoid using VBA and other non-function scripting: that I could devise myself;
All in one function: what I want to achieve here is to have one and one function only, not split the problem into multiple passages (such as for example copypasting a MIN() function below each column, that wouldn't do it);
The result should be a transposable array (which is already ok, I assume);
Where I am stranded with my solution so far:
The main issue here is that any function I am trying to use takes the entire matrix as a single array input and would calculate the MIN() of the entire matrix, not each column. My current (not working) function for an exemplary 4x4 matrix in range A1:D4 would be as below (the part in bold is where it is clearly not working):
=MIN(INDEX(A1:D4,SEQUENCE(4,4,1,1)))
which ofc does not work, because INDEX() does probably not "understand" SEQUENCE() as an array of items to take into account. Another, not working, way of solving this is to input a series of ranges (A1:A4;B1:B4;C1:C4;D1:D4) so that INDEX() "understands" the ranges as single columns, but ofc does not know and I do not know sincerely how to formulate that. I could use INDIRECT() in some way to reference the array of ranges, but do not know how and could find a way by searching online.
Fundamental question is: can a function, which works with single arrays, also work with multiple arrays? Basically, I do not know how to communicate an EXCEL array formula, that each batch of data I am inputting is a single array and must be evaluated separately (this is very easily solved with for() cycles, I know).
Many thanks for any suggestion and any workaround, any function and solution works as longs as it fits in the constrains defined above (maybe a LAMBA() function? don't know).
This is ofc a simplification of a way more complex problem (I am trying to calculate the annual mean temperature evolution for a specific location by finding the value - for each year from 1950 to 2021 - that is associated to the lat/lon coordinates that are the nearest to the one of the location inputted, given a netCDF-imported grid of time-arrayed data; the MIN() function is used to selected the nearest location, which is then used, via INDEX() to find temp data). I need to do this in one hit (meaning just pasting the function, which evaluates a matrix of data that is referenced by a fixed range), so that I can just use it modularly for other data sets. I already have a working solution, which is "elegant"* enough, but not "elegant"* as the one I could develop solving this issue.
*where "elegant"= it saves me one click every time for 1000+ datasets when applying the function.
If I understand your problem correct then this should solve it:
=BYCOL(A1:D4,LAMBDA(d,MIN(d)))
I have two lists (variable length) in Excel (1, 2 resp.) and wish to find the union of these:
My research yields numerous solutions / questions to this effect, however, they either focus on Office 365, VB, Lambdas, PowerQuery variations - they do not proivde a function fit for Excel 2010 etc.:
Requirements/research:
No Office 365 requirement (so no FilterXML, let, choose, etc. etc. - per here, here, here)
Am not interested in VB (trivial) / PowerQuery (ditto - i.e. simple 'insert/data/append 2 or more queries)
Am not interested in Lambda variations (per here)
Duplicates are fine
Progress
Have been contemplating an offset function that picks up values in the 2nd list once those in the first list are exhausted in an array function -- but am a litte lost otherwise (and don't want to restrict anyone in scope of functions that may be avail. in this regard).
Can someone assist me in finding a function per above pls?
Using INDEX/MATCH:
=IF(ROW(A1)>COUNTA($B$4:$B$6),INDEX($D$4:$D$7,ROW(A1)-COUNTA($B$4:$B$6)),INDEX($B$4:$B$6,ROW(A1)))
Put that in F4 and copy down.
Extrapolation in Excel is easy: have a list of numbers (and optionally their paired "X-values"), and it can easily generate further entries in the list with the GROWTH() function.
GROWTH() works for interpolation too: you just need to tell it the intermediate X-values that you want it to calculate for. My problem with it is the appearance of the data in the spreadsheet. Here's an example:
Say I have some inputs, and through some process get some outputs. Only, there were gaps in the experiment so no outputs were generated for some values:
Out of curiosity, I copied the data to the right, and used Excel's "Extend with Growth Trend": I highlighted the first two entries (only), then right-click-dragged-down the little square over the next four cells (overriding the final value there) and chose "Growth Trend" in the context menu. To remind myself that the values were Excel-generated, I gave them a grey background:
Hmm. The generated values (unsurprisingly) aren't a good extrapolation, since they don't factor in the later value. It's out by over 40%! Also note that this Extend feature of Excel is an ease-of-input mechanism, not a calculation tool in its own right - Excel enters the data as raw numbers (to multiple decimal places).
So I formalised the Extend column by using the GROWTH() function - again only factoring in the first two values, but also using their paired X-values and the desired interpolation entry as parameters:
D4: =GROWTH(D$2:D$3,$A$2:$A$3,$A4)
D5: =GROWTH(D$2:D$3,$A$2:$A$3,$A5)
D6: =GROWTH(D$2:D$3,$A$2:$A$3,$A6)
Thankfully, the results mimic those of the previous column (Microsoft use the same mechanism for both features!) I didn't overwrite the last entry, since after all it has the value that I actually want! The fact that the calculated values are the same as before is the problem I'm trying to fix, and that this question is about.
To improve the calculated values, I need to incorporate the last value - but at the same time I want the "natural" sequence of input values to be maintained. In other words, I want the interpolated values to be placed in situ. That implies that the arguments to the GROWTH() function need to be discontiguous ranges, which Excel does by using the (Range,Range,...) syntax. I tried it, and got #REF! errors. I then tried using a named discontiguous range: same result.
After a bit of Googling (and StackOverflowing!) I found references to using INDIRECT() - a particularly problematic 'solution', since it evaluates strings that would need to be manually maintained. Nevertheless:
E4: =GROWTH(INDIRECT({"E2:E3","E7"}),INDIRECT({"A2:A3","A7"}),A4)
E5: =GROWTH(INDIRECT({"E2:E3","E7"}),INDIRECT({"A2:A3","A7"}),A5)
E6: =GROWTH(INDIRECT({"E2:E3","E7"}),INDIRECT({"A2:A3","A7"}),A6)
…and after all that it didn't work anyway! The values remained the same as the previous version, that didn't incorporate the last value. Maybe the last value doesn't make for better interpolation results? So, as an experiment, I ignored the "in situ" requirement and generated an "ex situ" version, with the known values followed by the desired values, allowing me to use simple ranges. Success! But to highlight that the data is in the wrong order, I asked Excel to create an X-Y plot of the data too:
B13: =GROWTH(B$10:B$12,$A$10:$A$12,$A13)
B14: =GROWTH(B$10:B$12,$A$10:$A$12,$A14)
B15: =GROWTH(B$10:B$12,$A$10:$A$12,$A15)
Of course, the results are exponential not linear, so setting the Y-axis to logarithmic generates a very readable result - and it effectively masks the back-and-forth of the data. But deep down, we both know that the data is wrong - just look at the table!
Maybe, just maybe, if I used Excel's "Sort Data" feature it would break up the range for me, and show me how I should have written the formulae? Sadly, although it looks like it worked, I get a "Circular reference" error for B12 - the range wasn't modified to make it discontiguous, and now B12's result is dependent on the original range which includes itself! I coloured it below to indicate that this isn't a viable solution:
So, my "final" solution is to maintain the previous "ex situ" version, and simply have an "in situ" column as well that does a VLOOKUP() on the ExSitu (named) table - and I needed to tell it to do an exact match with the FALSE parameter, since the list isn't sorted:
F4: =VLOOKUP($A4,ExSitu,2,FALSE)
F5: =VLOOKUP($A5,ExSitu,2,FALSE)
F6: =VLOOKUP($A6,ExSitu,2,FALSE)
Note that I labelled the column with an asterisk since it's a cheat: the values are only in situ by copying from another table.
Phew! After all that, my question:
Is there a way to directly interpolate the "in situ" values, without having to have an "ex situ" lookup table to generate the results? The above example was deliberately straightforward: you can easily imagine a longer list with more gaps to be filled in.
Since you had a good data sense, I'll share my discovery path on this case. I'm more like a visual person. I don't see things 'that' clear via tables. Here is what I do to you data points. :
Input Raw
360 7.16
370 28.9
380
390
400
410 5,380.00
Highlight all and press my favorite button > F11. I choose line chart type. Then with the plus button on the top left of the chart, I add trendline > more options.. From there I choose 'polynomial' and 'exponential' . Plus, a tick on 'display equation on chart' As you can see in the links, both fit seem ok. just take the equation and fit in for other values as needed.
Three things I've noticed :
The polynomial and exponential fit is close enough to what I need. But it doesn't exactly 'map' on the ( 410, 5380.00 ) point.
By having the formula I find it easier to make sense of whether or not the trendline 'proposed' by excel is a close fit to my need. As you play around you can see how far-off the linear & logarithmic trendline can be.
The trendline equation doesn't really map to 360,370,410... point as the x value, it assumes x is 0,1,2,3... (try to test it with the 'equation' of the excel proposed trendline)
IMHO, use excel trend with care. My next best fitting tool -> wolframalpha logarithmic fit.
For the original question :
Is there a way to directly interpolate the "in situ" values, without having to have an "ex situ" lookup table to generate the results?
I think my simple answer will be : Indirectly, Yes. Directly? not sure.
Hope this heals/helps in some ways.. ( :
It seems like a bit of an omission that there's no easy way to create a user-defined declarative function in Excel without defining a macro. I can't use XSLM with the uphill battle that will entail in the Enterprise, but I want to be able to define a function with intent thus.
I want to do this;
=BreakEven(C1:C20)
But I can't use a macro, although I can use a "named formula". The trouble is how to pass parameters to that? I've seen a couple of tricks (kludgy workarounds) but not for xslx.
I'd like to be able to define a Breakeven() function in another tab and reference it here passing in MORE THAN one parameter, two ranges in fact. I'm sure there's some way using string parsing but I can't see it.
I don't mind if the function doesn't look exactly like that, as long as it evaluates within the cell and I can parse it for 'intent'. For instance, this example (http://www.jkp-ads.com/articles/ExcelNames09.asp) which I was unable to get to work in xlsx uses this syntax;
=IF(ROW(D3),CellColor)
Where "cellcolor" is the name of the function and D3 is the range parameter. The other solution I'm toying with is to define a function in column format with a variable argument list (this is two rows of an excel spreadsheet);
[Value][function][parameter1][parameter2][parameter3]
24050 BreakEven C1:C20 A1:A20
It's not pretty, but the benefit of the latter is that it describes the function to an external reader. We know it's a breakeven function, whereas if we put the actual formula "OFFSET,INDIRECT,SUM()()()()etc" it would not be readable/parseable. Of course, in that case, I'd have to construct the value field by parsing the cells to the right in Excel, which would make the Value formula messy but at least it would be a self-describing row.
Can anyone suggest a better method?
Poor-man's UDF
So I think what we're going to have to do is this;
A B C D E
1 [Value][function][parameter1][parameter2][parameter3]
2 24050 BreakEven C1:C20 A1:A20
3 111 mySum 1 10 100
Where "BreakEven" is a "named function". Here's the formula for "mySum";
=sum(C1:E1)
To evaluate functions listed in B, we just put this in column A (transposing the same value for all rows in column A;
=value(B)
This works because A2 and A3 both evaluate column B as a value, which causes BreakEven and Sum to run (as poor-man's UDFs) in the context of A2 and A3. The range (C1:E1) is relative of course.
So in effect, we can write any function name in column B (as long as there's a corresponding named function defined in the workbook which can be as complex as you like). Columns C, D and E act as the parameters for the function on the same row.
I would have loved to just be able to write the following in column A instead;
=mySum(1,10,100)
But in the absence of that support, the mechanism above serves to provide a readable parameterised function that would be understandable by a user, that's also machine readable (works in CSV too) and allows us to offload our re-usable functions to a library sheet somewhere in the workbook for maintenance.
Not perfect, but an acceptable compromise, unless anyone has a clever way of doing this in a single cell?
Not really an answer, but easier to illustrate here than in a comment. Although you can't rename formulas in a simplistic way - I like your suggestion actually I've never thought about that before; but then I've never worked in a non-macro environment so this has never occurred- you can add notes into the actual formula explaining what it does. For example:
=N("This is a really complex BreakEven Formula")+SUM(3,4,5)
Is a perfectly valid formula. As I said, not really an answer, but could potentially add clarity to a complex formula
You can do this with a small trick
For example to create effectively a cuberoot UDF that emulates =cuberoot(x) then name a variable as cuberoot with a 'value' like this.
=(RC[-1])^(1/3)
Now you can either do this using a temporary switch to RC mode, or put the cursor in say cell E5 and type the name value as =(D5)^(1/3)
Now whenever you need a cuberoot you can put the argument in any cell and put =cuberoot in the cell to its right. It really works and follows true Excel rules.
I use it for multiparameter models that have the single 'argument' Time as a dependent variable. I then define the term Model as the model equation eg =a+bTime+cTime^2
where a,b,c are already named locations holding unique parameter values -
and then define Time as =RC[-1]
My sheets are filled with cells simply saying =Model and have the required time value to the left (ie their argument). It is simple to extend to multi arg functions using multiple cells. It usually fits in well with spreadsheet layouts. Change the definition of your model once in the define name box and all places change simultaneously.
I have a function called ToDMS which takes the decimal degree value in the preceding cell and converts it to a deg Min and Sec string - very tidy.
You need the degrees to be in a single cell but want it in the alt. form in another cell
elegant, simple and it works
Bob Jordan
=OFFSET(INDIRECT(ADDRESS(ROW(), COLUMN())),-4,2+MATCH(MIN(OFFSET(INDIRECT(ADDRESS(ROW(), COLUMN())),0,3,1,10)), OFFSET(INDIRECT(ADDRESS(ROW(), COLUMN())),0,3,1,10), 0),1,1)
in the above example (don't consider what it does), I have to evaluate twice the exact same expression : OFFSET(INDIRECT(ADDRESS(ROW(), COLUMN())),0,3,1,10)
Is there a way to add variables on the fly in formulas? So that we store once the result and simply refer to it later on within the formula ? This is an example in which the cost of computing several times the same thing has no impact, but what about more costly calls or computations ?
I'm thinking of some feature that are existing in recursive functional languages such as Caml.
If your question relates to the convenience of writing formulas, the Name Manager is what you're looking for. See in the ribbon menu in the tab "formulas". Click on "new"
Name: MyArray
Scope: Workbook
Refers to: =OFFSET(INDIRECT(ADDRESS(ROW(), COLUMN())),0,3,1,10)
If your question relates to computation cost, I believe your only solution is to physically store the intermediate results in an additional column or separate worksheet.
9 years later, this is possible!
If you have Microsoft 365, you can use "LET" to define a temporary variable.
Eg =LET(MyTempVar, 2, MyTempVar + 3) would be a really bad way to calculate 2 + 3 = 5.
In your case, you'd do
=LET(MyTempVar, OFFSET(INDIRECT(ADDRESS(ROW(),COLUMN())),0,3,1,10), formula)
You could replace Indirect(address(row(),Column()) with a simple relative cell reference, but to answer your question:
yes it is possible using Laurent Longre's MOREFUNC addin - it has functions SETV and GETV that do exactly what you want.