The Least You Need to Know

Microsoft Excel 2010’s new and improved features help you get more done more quickly and easily than ever before. To discover some of the most useful features included in Excel 2010, see the suggestions below.

The Ribbon User Interface

For those who have worked with Excel 2003, the first thing you will notice when using Excel 2010 is that Microsoft has done away with the standard toolbar. That is, you don’t see the typical pull-down menus found in older versions of Word, PowerPoint, and Excel. Instead, you’ll see the interface dubbed the Ribbon.

Using Format As Table

You can use Excel’s Format As Table feature, which can format selected cells using predefined formats. This feature is a quick way to format large amounts of data and provides ideas on how to manually format data. To learn more, see page 74.

Adding a Legend

If you are plotting two or more data series in one chart, it’s definitely a best practice to have a legend. Considering the fact that you will probably add data to your chart, going from one data series to many, it’s helpful to know how to add a legend after your chart has been created. To learn more, see page 125.

Using Backstage View

Excel 2010 consolidates most printing options into the Backstage View, which provides an easy way to quickly configure Excel’s print options. To learn more, see page 142.

Working with Pivot Tables

A pivot table is an analysis tool that allows you to create an interactive view of your dataset. We call this view a pivot table report. With a pivot table report, you can quickly and easily categorize your data into groups, summarize large amounts of data into meaningful information, and perform a wide variety of calculations in a fraction of the time it takes by hand. To learn more, see page 164.