COMPUTER SOLUTION: Microsoft Office Excel 2007 Excel in a Nutshell

Microsoft Excel has been referred to as "the best application ever written for Windows." You may or may not agree with that statement, but you can't deny that Excel is one of the oldest Windows products and has undergone many re- incarnations and face-lifts over the years. Cosmetically, the current version-Excel 2007-barely even resembles the original version. However, many of Excel's key elements have remained intact over the years, with significant enhancements, of course.

This chapter presents a concise overview of the features available in the more recent versions of Excel, with specific emphasis on Excel 2007. It sets the stage for the subsequent chapters and provides an overview for those who may have let their Excel skill get rusty.

Note

If you're an old hand at Excel, you may want to read only the section on the Excel user interface and ignore or briefly skim the rest of the chapter.

The History of Excel

You probably weren't expecting a history lesson when you bought this book, but you may find this information interesting. At the very least, this section provides fodder for the next office trivia match.

Spreadsheets comprise a huge business, but most of us tend to take this software for granted. In the pre-spreadsheet days, people relied on clumsy mainframes or calculators and spent hours doing what now takes minutes.

It Started with VisiCalc

Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston conjured up VisiCalc, the world's first electronic spread- sheet, back in the late 1970s when personal computers were unheard of in the office environment. They wrote VisiCalc for the Apple II computer, an interesting machine that seems like a toy by today's standards. VisiCalc caught on quickly, and many forward-looking companies purchased the Apple II for the sole purpose of developing their budgets with VisiCalc. Consequently, VisiCalc is often credited for much of Apple II's initial success.

Then Came Lotus

When the IBM PC arrived on the scene in 1982, thus legitimizing personal computers, VisiCorp wasted no time porting VisiCalc to this new hardware environment. Envious of VisiCalc's success, a small group of computer enthusiasts at a start-up company in Cambridge, Massachusetts, refined the spreadsheet concept. Headed by Mitch Kapor and Jonathon Sachs, the company designed a new product and launched the software industry's first full-fledged marketing blitz. Released in January 1983, Lotus Development Corporation's 1-2-3 proved an instant success. Despite its $495 price tag (yes, people really paid that much for a single program), it quickly outsold VisiCalc and rocketed to the top of the sales charts, where it remained for many years. Lotus 1-2-3 was, perhaps, the most popular application ever.

Microsoft Enters the Picture

Most people don't realize that Microsoft's experience with spreadsheets extends back to the early 1980s. In 1982, Microsoft released its first spreadsheet-MultiPlan. Designed for computers running the CP/M operating system, the product was subsequently ported to several other platforms, including Apple II, Apple III, XENIX, and MS-DOS. MultiPlan essentially ignored existing software user-interface standards. Difficult to learn and use, it never earned much of a following in the United States. Not surprisingly, Lotus 1-2-3 pretty much left MultiPlan in the dust.

Excel partly evolved from MultiPlan, first surfacing in 1985 on the Macintosh. Like all Mac applications, Excel was a graphics-based program (unlike the character-based MultiPlan). In November 1987, Microsoft released the first version of Excel for Windows (labeled Excel 2 to correspond with the Macintosh version). Excel didn't catch on right away, but as Windows gained popularity, so did Excel. Lotus eventually released a Windows version of 1-2-3, and Excel had additional competition from Quattro Pro-originally a DOS program developed by Borland International, then sold to Novell, and then sold again to Corel (its current owner).

Excel Versions

Excel 2007 is actually Excel 12 in disguise. You may think that this name represents the twelfth version of Excel. Think again. Microsoft may be a successful company, but its version-naming techniques can prove quite confusing. As you'll see, Excel 2007 actually represents the tenth Windows version of Excel. In the following sections, I briefly describe the major Windows versions of Excel.

EXCEL 2

The original version of Excel for Windows, Excel 2 first appeared in late 1987. It was labeled Version 2 to correspond to the Macintosh version (the original Excel). Because Windows wasn't in widespread use at the time, this version included a runtime version of Windows-a special version with just enough features to run Excel and nothing else. This version appears quite crude by today's standards.

The original Excel 2 for Windows. Excel has come a long way since its original version. (Photo courtesy of Microsoft Corporation)

EXCEL 3

At the end of 1990, Microsoft released Excel 3 for Windows. This version offered a significant improvement in both appearance and features. It included toolbars, drawing capabilities, worksheet outlining, add-in support, 3-D charts, workgroup editing, and lots more.

EXCEL 4

Excel 4 hit the streets in the spring of 1992. This version made quite an impact on the marketplace as Windows increased in popularity. It boasted lots of new features and usability enhancements that made it easier for beginners to get up to speed quickly.

EXCEL 5

In early 1994, Excel 5 appeared on the scene. This version introduced tons of new features, including multisheet workbooks and the new Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) macro language. Like its predecessor, Excel 5 took top honors in just about every spreadsheet comparison published in the trade magazines.

EXCEL 95

Excel 95 (also known as Excel 7) shipped in the summer of 1995. On the surface, it resembled Excel 5 (this version included only a few major new features). However, Excel 95 proved to be significant because it presented the first version to use more advanced 32-bit code. Excel 95 and Excel 5 use the same file format.

EXCEL 97

Excel 97 (also known as Excel 8) probably offered the most significant upgrade ever. The toolbars and menus took on a great new look, online help moved a dramatic step forward, and the number of rows available in a worksheet quadrupled. And if you're a macro developer, you may have noticed that Excel's programming environment (VBA) moved up several notches on the scale. Excel 97 also introduced a new file format.

EXCEL 2000

Excel 2000 (also known as Excel 9) was released in June of 1999. Excel 2000 offered several minor enhancements, but the most significant advancement was the ability to use HTML as an alternative file format. Excel 2000 still supported the standard binary file format, of course, which is compatible with Excel 97.

EXCEL 2002

Excel 2002 (also known as Excel 10) was released in June of 2001 and is part of Microsoft Office XP. This version offered several new features, most of which are fairly minor and were designed to appeal to novice users. Perhaps the most significant new feature was the capability to save your work when Excel crashes and also recover corrupt workbook files that you may have abandoned long ago. Excel 2002 also added background formula error checking and a new formula-debugging tool.

EXCEL 2003

Excel 2003 (also known as Excel 11) was released in the fall of 2003. This version had very few new features. Perhaps the most significant new feature was the ability to import and export XML files and map the data to specific cells in a worksheet. It also introduced the concept of the List, a specially designated range of cells. Both of these features would prove to be precursors to future enhancements.

EXCEL 2007

Excel 2007 (also known as Excel 12) was released in early 2007. Its official name is Microsoft Office Excel 2007. This latest Excel release represents the most significant change since Excel 97, including a change to Excel's default file format. The new format is XML based although a binary format is still available. Another major change is the Ribbon, a new type of user interface that replaces the Excel menu and toolbar system. In addition to these two major changes, Microsoft has enhanced the List concept introduced in Excel 2003 (a List is now known as a Table), improved the look of charts, significantly increased the number of rows and columns, and added some new worksheet functions. For more, see the sidebar, "What's New in Excel 2007?".