This video is a demonstrations on different ways to display number data (especially decimals)
in Microsoft excel 2010. I have a spreadsheet set up here with 4 lists of random numbers.
Each of these sets will have a different type of formatting applied to it. To begin with
we will start with set number 1. We will highlight the whole set by pressing control, shift and
down which automatically highlights the entire row of values. Then go to the home tab. In
the home tab "number" over here will allow you to change the number formatting. As you
can see in this set some of the values have decimal points and others are in scientific
notation. If you want to have all of the decimal points shown you can switch to number and
then increase the decimal. You can continue increasing it until the end of all of the
numbers is 0. Once you have 0 at the end of every number that means that you have extended
it out as far as it will go. In this case i can see that there are two zeros beyond
each number at least so i will take it back 2 and now here is my list of data with just
the values in decimal. Some times however it is better to keep it in scientific notation.
In that case you go back to this and scroll down to scientific. Now the values are easier
to read since all of the values have the same formatting. The second set I am going to put
in percents. One thing you will notice is that each of these values are between 0 and
100. If I do control, shift and down again to select the entire column and then up here
i either press the percent button or go to percentage here. You will notice that it does
seem to have worked properly. These number symbols mean that the column is not wide enough
to display the data. If I extend the column I can see that the values are not longer between
0 and 100. Looking at this it seems that they are between 0 and 10,000. If you want your
values to display the original number as a percent what you need to do is first translate
it into percent form. What I mean by this is for 14 to equal 14% it has to be 0.14 which
is 0.14 of 1. You can enter this using a formula. For example if I press equals sign and then
select the cell next to it then it will enter "B7" automatically into my cell. I can then
divide it by 100 and press enter. Now I have a new column started with 0.14. If I double
click on the fill handle it will automatically fill in those values for the entire column
and highlight the column. Now if I go up here and press percent the values are in percent.
The decimal places are however now shown. If I wish for them to be shown I just increase
the decimal and now I have this list of percents including their decimals which are the same
as their values in the column next to it. This third set I am going to change into number
format and there are a few easy ways to do this. The first is you can decrease the decimal
point until you only have 2 decimal places left. Then you have 42 dollars and 67 cents
or you can highlight the whole column and select the dollar sign here. There are a couple
of different ways to do this. Generally if you just select it then it will put it into
English format with a dollar sign on the left of the cell. Let's say one of these values
was negative. In this accounting format it will put parenthesis around negative values
but I want it to stand out more than that. I right click and click format cells. Now
in the dialog box I go to number and I see that i have accounting here. I also have the
option of currency and in currency it gives you different places for how you want the
negative values to be shown. I want them to be displayed in red so I will select that
one and press ok. Now as you can see the dollar sign is at the front of the value but the
negative values are displayed in red. This 4th set I am going to highlight the whole
column and I am going to change it into fraction. To do that I do general and scroll down to
fraction and select. Now all of the numbers have been changed into fractions. If for example
I were to select this column again and change it back to number the values will be changed
back to number although with the number format the default is for only 2 places after the
period. I can also change it back to text which will display whatever is entered in
the cell exactly how it is entered. If we switch back to general it will automatically
format it the way it thinks it should be.