14.1: Functions of a Spreadsheet

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The purpose of a spreadsheet is to organize and calculate information. Spreadsheets are utilized by many different businesses and organizations to perform a variety of tasks. The most commons tasks performed by spreadsheet software include functions, computations, statistical analysis, and formatting. This text will focus on excel when discussing spreadsheets.

Functions: Excel is a spreadsheet consisting of unlimited numbers of cells. Cells are where information is stored. Spreadsheets feature columns and rows to keep information legible and simple to understand. You can use spreadsheets to enter data, calculate equations and create charts and graphs. What's more, you can build upon previous work by using formulas and functions so that if the information is changed, your calculations adjust to the changes.

Computations: Excel is able to compute a variety of mathematical functions, from simple equations like addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division to more complex financial calculations like Mortgage Amortizations, and Net Present Value (NPV). It can also create “what-if” scenarios and can create relational functions such as greater than, equal than and less than.

Statistical Analysis: Excel is also able to allow the user to conduct statistical analysis, calculating mean, median, mode, averages, and standard deviation. Excel can be used to calculate percentiles and rank categories and items.

Formatting: Excel provides maximum flexibility to customize the worksheet (the workspace of excel) and organize data. Excel allows cells, rows, and columns to expand, merge, be inserted and deleted. You can even place inside cells pictures, tables, hyperlinks, and text from other word documents. Data can be sorted in alpha and numerical order.