MICROSOFT EXCEL 2010

 DEFINITION:

Software developed and manufactured by Microsoft Corporation that allows users to organize, format, and calculate data with formulas using a spreadsheet system broken up by rows and columns. Microsoft Excel usually comes bundled with Microsoft Office and is compatible with other applications offered in the suite of products. The first software program similar to Excel was released in 1982 and was called Multiplan.

NEW FEATURES:

·         NEW NAMED SETS

            Named Sets support has been provided in Microsoft Excel 2010, this feature allows you to create your own named sets. Simply locate the  Fields, Items, & Sets button under the Ribbon, and it will allow you to define your own Named Sets.

·         NEW 64-BIT SUPPORT

            Microsoft provides 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Office 2010. At first you might think it to be a common news, but there is one important advantage – now you can create a spreadsheet with a size  up to 4GB.

·         NEW SEARCH FILTER

            When you filter data in Excel tables, PivotTables, and PivotCharts, you can use a new search box, which helps you to find what you need in long lists. For example, to find a specific product in a catalog that stocks over 100,000 items, start by typing your search term, and relevant items instantly appear in the list. You can narrow the results further by deselecting the items you don't want to see.

·         NEW CHARTING LIMITS

            In Excel 2010, the limitation on the number of data points that can be created on a chart has been removed. The number of data points is limited only by available memory. This enables people—particularly those of you in the scientific community—to more effectively visualize and analyze large sets of data.

·         NEW SMART GRAPHICS LAYOUT

            With new picture layouts, you can tell your story with photographs. For example, use the Captioned Picture layout to show pictures with nice-looking captions underneath. 

IMPROVED FEATURES:

·         IMPROVED CONDITIONAL FORMATTING

Conditional formatting makes it easy to highlight interesting cells or ranges of cells, emphasize unusual values, and visualize data by using data bars, color scales, and icon sets. Excel 2010 includes even greater formatting flexibility:\

·         IMPROVED SOLVER ADD-IN

Excel 2010 includes a new version of the Solver add-in, which you can use to find optimal solutions in what-if analysis. Solver has an improved user interface, a new Evolutionary Solver, based on genetic algorithms, that handles models with any Excel functions, new global optimization options, better linear programming and nonlinear optimization methods, and new Linearity and Feasibility reports. In addition, the Solver add-in is now available in a 64-bit version.

·         IMPROVED FUNCTION ACCURACY

In response to feedback from the academic, engineering, and scientific communities, Excel 2010 now includes a set of more accurate statistical and other functions. Certain existing functions have also been renamed to better describe what they do.

·         IMPROVED FILTER CAPABILITIES

In addition to slicers, which are described earlier in this article, Excel 2010 comes with new features that make it easier to sort and filter data.

·         IMPROVED PICTURE-EDITING TOOLS

Communicating ideas in Excel 2010 isn't always about showing numbers or charts. If you want to use photos, drawings, or SmartArt to communicate visually, you can take advantage of the following features:

COMPARISON

              Excel Compare supports all versions of Microsoft Excel, and conveniently creates a difference report as a new Excel sheet. It supports comparing the sheets that contain database structures, and correctly processes data that does not have unique identifiers. Excel Compare treats inserted rows and columns in a correct manner, reporting that a row or column has been added or removed, without creating the visual clutter of multiple raw-to-raw or column-to-column changes. Updated cells will be highlighted, allowing you to synchronize changes between the two sheets of data.


ISSUE:

      I'll open an existing, or brand new, spreadsheet and make some changes. Then I click the save, or ctrl+s, and the document saves just fine. I then have to save the file to another location, so I do save as, which also goes smoothly. Now, if I happen to make more changes and try to save those changes, nothing happens. When I click save, it doesn't save. When I click save as, a dialog box doesn't even appear.
However, when I go to close out of Excel it'll still ask me if I want to save the changes. At which point it doesn't matter if I click save, or don't save, because the changes will not be saved no matter what.Does anybody have any ideas here?
I'm running 2010 Excel 32b on XP if that helps.


REFLECTION:

          Although I personally like EXCEL very much I'm going to stretch a bit and tell you what I feel are it's disadvantages. you don't need to debate with me about what I'm saying

I find it very frustrating to deal with printing a spreadsheet that is too wide for the paper - granted it can be done but not in a very intuitive way. Setting PRINT AREA's and FIT TO PAPER are not easily accessible.

I find that although it's very liberal in how it deals with datatypes of columns - it can truly make a mess of data.

Cutting, pasting, inserting and removing rows or columns could be stronger in the way that formula's might be stretched to include these new rows or columns. I find that it's painful now if you need to perform tasks like this in a complex spreadsheet.

It is such a huge and complex product - has so much functionality - that to become an expert in it's use is nearly a full time job. That's both an advantage and disadvantage.