Number, Styles, Cells, and Editing groups.
❯❯ Insert tab with the command buttons normally used when adding particular elements (including graphics, PivotTables, charts, hyperlinks, and headers and footers) to a spreadsheet, arranged into the Tables, Illustrations, Apps, Charts, Reports, Sparklines, Filter, Links, Text, and Symbols groups.
❯❯ Page Layout tab with the command buttons normally used when preparing a spreadsheet for printing or re-ordering graphics on the sheet, arranged into the Themes, Page Setup, Scale to Fit, Sheet Options, and Arrange groups.
❯❯ Formulas tab with the command buttons normally used when adding formulas and functions to a spreadsheet or checking a worksheet for formula errors, arranged into the Function Library, Defined Names, Formula Auditing, and Calculation groups. Note: This tab also contains a Solutions group when you activate certain add-in programs, such as Analysis ToolPak and Euro Currency Tools. See Chapter 12 for more on using Excel add-in programs.
❯❯ Data tab with the command buttons normally used when importing, querying, outlining, and subtotaling the data placed into a worksheet’s data list, arranged into the Get External Data, Connections, Sort & Filter, Data Tools, and Outline groups. Note: This tab also contains an Analysis group when you activate add-ins, such as Analysis ToolPak and Solver. See Chapter 12 for more on Excel add-ins.
❯❯ Review tab with the command buttons normally used when proofing, protecting, and marking up a spreadsheet for review by others, arranged into the Proofing, Language, Comments, and Changes groups. Note: This tab also contains an Ink group with a sole Start Inking button when you’re running Office 2016 on a device with a touchscreen such as a Tablet PC or a computer equipped with a digital ink tablet.
❯❯ View tab with the command buttons normally used when changing the display of the Worksheet area and the data it contains, arranged into the Workbook Views, Show, Zoom, Window, and Macros groups.
Although these standard tabs are the ones you always see on the Ribbon when it’s displayed in Excel, they aren’t the only things that can appear in this area. Excel can display contextual tools when you’re working with a particular object that you select in the worksheet, such as a graphic image you’ve added or a chart or PivotTable you’ve created. The name of the contextual tool for the selected object appears immediately above the tab or tabs associated with the tools.
For example, Figure 1-5 shows a worksheet after you click the embedded chart to select it. As you can see, doing this adds the contextual tool called Chart Tools to the very end of the Ribbon. The Chart Tools contextual tool has its two tabs: Design (selected) and Format. Note, too, that the command buttons on the Design tab are arranged into the groups Chart Layouts, Chart Styles, Data, Type, and Location.
FIGURE 1-5: When you select certain objects in the worksheet, Excel adds contextual tools to the Ribbon with their own tabs, groups, and command buttons.
Because Excel 2016 runs on many different types of devices from desktop computer to touchscreen tablets, the most efficient means of selecting Ribbon commands depends not only on the device on which you’re running the program, but also on the way that device is equipped.
For example, when I run Excel 2016 on my Microsoft Surface 3 tablet in its dock equipped with a physical keyboard and with my optical wireless mouse connected, I select commands from the Excel Ribbon more or less the same way I do when running Excel on my Windows desktop computer equipped with a stand-alone physical keyboard and mouse or laptop computer with its built-in physical keyboard and trackpad.
However, when I run Excel 2016 on my Surface 3 tablet without access to the dock with its physical keyboard and mouse, I am limited to selecting Ribbon commands directly on the touchscreen with my finger or stylus.
The most direct method for selecting Ribbon commands on a device equipped with a physical keyboard and mouse is to click the tab that contains the command button you want and then click that button in its group. For example, to insert an online image into your spreadsheet, you click the Insert tab and then click the Illustrations button followed by the Online Pictures button to open the Insert Pictures dialog box.
The easiest method for selecting commands on the Ribbon – if you know your keyboard at all well – is to press the keyboard’s Alt key and then type the letter of the hot key that appears on the tab you want to select. Excel then displays all the command button hot keys next to their buttons, along with the hot keys for the dialog box launchers in any group on that tab. To select a command button or dialog box launcher, simply type its hot key letter.
If you know the old Excel shortcut keys from versions prior to Excel 2007, you can still use them. For example, instead of going through the rigmarole of pressing Alt+HCC to copy a cell selection to the Windows Clipboard and then Alt+HVP to paste it elsewhere in the sheet, you can still press Ctrl+C to copy the selection and then press Ctrl+V when you’re ready to paste it.
Before trying to select Excel Ribbon commands by touch, however, you definitely want to turn on Touch mode in Excel 2016. When you do this, Excel spreads out the command buttons on the Ribbon tabs by putting more space around them, making it more likely you’ll actually select the command button you’re tapping with your finger (or stylus) instead of one right next to it. (This is a particular problem with the command buttons in the Font group on the Home tab that enable you to add different attributes to cell entries, such as bold, italic, or underlining: They are so close together when Touch mode is off that they are almost impossible to correctly select by touch.)
To do this, simply tap the Touch/Mouse Mode button that appears near the end of the Quick Access toolbar sandwiched between the Redo and Customize Quick Access Toolbar buttons. When you tap this button a drop-down menu with two options, Mouse and Touch, appears. Tap the Touch option to put your touchscreen tablet or laptop into Touch mode.
WHAT CLICK AND DRAG
