Analyzing Data

Getting Started with OpenOffice 4

Chapter 4: Getting Started with Calc

< Previous Section

Next Section >

• What is Calc
• Parts of the main Calc window
• Open and Save CSV files
• Navigating within spreadsheets
  • Going to a particular cell
  • Moving from cell to cell
  • Moving from sheet to sheet
• Selecting items in a sheet or a spreadsheet
  • Selecting Cells
  • Selecting Columns and Rows
  • Selecting Sheets
• Working with Columns and Rows
• Working with Sheets
• Viewing Calc
• Entering data using the keyboard
• Speeding up data entry
• Validating cell contents
• Editing data
• Formatting data
• Auto-formatting cells and sheets
• Formatting spreadsheets using themes
• Using conditional formatting
• Hiding and showing data
• Sorting records
• Using formulas and functions
• Analyzing data
• Printing from Calc
  • Using Print Ranges
  • Selecting the Page Order, Details, and Scale
  • Page Breaks
  • Headers and Footers

< Previous Page

Next Page >

Analyzing Data

Calc includes several tools to help you analyze the information in your spreadsheets, ranging from features for copying and reusing data, to creating subtotals automatically, to varying information to help you find the answers you need. These tools are divided between the Tools and Data menus.

One of the most useful of these tools is the Pivot Table. This is a tool for combining, comparing, and analyzing large amounts of data easily. Using the Pivot Table, you can view different summaries of the source data, display the details of areas of interest, and create reports, whether you are a beginner, an intermediate or advanced user. Refer to Chapter 8 in the Calc Guide for more information.

Other analysis options include:

Consolidation

Data → Consolidate provides a way to combine data from two or more ranges of cells into a new range while running one of several functions (such as Sum or Average) on the data.

Subtotals

Use Data → Subtotals to calculate subtotals for up to three columns.

Scenarios

Tools → Scenarios opens a dialog for testing “what-if” questions, such as different interest rates on a loan.

Goal seek

Use Tools → Goal Seek if you know the result you want, but need to discover what values will produce this result.

Solver

Tools → Solver is similar to Goal Seek, but you can use more than one variable. The Solver is designed to minimize or maximize the result according to a set of rules that you define.

All of these options are further discussed in Chapter 9 in the Calc Guide.