edubun 한국어
Home›Spreadsheets and data

Spreadsheet basics

Six units on how a spreadsheet works in Microsoft Excel and Google Sheets: cells and ranges, the kinds of values a cell can hold, writing formulas, adding up with SUM, copying formulas so they adjust themselves, and reading the error values. Every unit has a small working spreadsheet with tasks that are checked as you type.

Progress
  1. 1Cells, rows, columns and ranges
  2. 2Numbers, text and dates
  3. 3Writing your first formulas
  4. 4Adding up with SUM
  5. 5Copying formulas: relative references
  6. 6Reading error values
Sources for this course (2)
  • Microsoft Support, "Excel specifications and limits" (support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/excel-specifications-and-limits-1672b34d-7043-467e-8e27-269d656771c3: 1,048,576 rows by 16,384 columns, 15-digit precision, 255 arguments), "Calculation operators and precedence in Excel" (.../calculation-operators-and-precedence-in-excel-48be406d-4975-4d31-b2b8-7af9e0e2878a: operators, order negation % ^ * / + - & comparisons, =5+2*3 is 11, ="1"+"2" is 3, ="A"&TRUE is ATRUE, #### for too little space), "SUM function" (.../sum-function-043e1c7d-7726-4e80-8f32-07b23e057f89: up to 255 numbers, =A1+B1+C1 gives #VALUE! with text while SUM ignores text), "Switch between relative, absolute, and mixed references" (.../dfec08cd-ae65-4f56-839e-5f0d8d0baca9: =B4*C4 copied from D4 to D5 becomes =B5*C5), "Date systems in Excel" (.../e7fe7167-48a9-4b96-bb53-5612a800b487: July 5, 2011 is 40729 in the 1900 system and 39267 in the 1904 system, 1,462 days apart), "Remove or allow a circular reference" (.../8540bd0f-6e97-4483-bcf7-1b49cd50d123: warning, then 0 or the last value), VLOOKUP and IF pages (#N/A, #NAME? from missing quotes). Google Docs Editors Help: SUM (support.google.com/docs/answer/3093669: any number of arguments), DATE (answer/3092969: days counted from December 30, 1899), Keyboard shortcuts for Google Sheets (answer/181110: Ctrl+D fill down, Ctrl+R fill right, Ctrl+~ show all formulas, F4 absolute/relative), Files you can store in Google Drive (support.google.com/drive/answer/37603: up to 20 million cells per spreadsheet), ERROR.TYPE (answer/3238305: the error values). History: Smithsonian National Museum of American History, VisiCalc software and documentation, object nmah_1696121 (Bricklin and Frankston, Apple II, 1979)
  • ACM Interactions, "The first killer app: a history of spreadsheets" (2013: Lotus 1-2-3, Excel for the Macintosh in 1985)

Checked: 2026-10-17