Aligning Text

Introduction

Worksheets that have not been formatted are often very difficult to read. Fortunately, Excel gives you many tools that allow you to format text and tables in various ways. One of the ways you can format your worksheet so that it is easier to work with is to apply different types of alignment to text.

In this lesson, you will learn how to left, center, and right align text, merge and center cells, vertically align text, and apply different types of text control.

Aligning Text

Excel 2007 left-aligns text (labels) and right-aligns numbers (values). This makes data easier to read, but you do not have to use these defaults. Text and numbers can be defined as left-aligned, right-aligned or centered in Excel.

To Align Text or Numbers in a Cell:

• Select a cell or range of cells
• Click on either the Align Left, Center or Align Right commands on the Home tab.

• The text or numbers in the cell(s) take on the selected alignment treatment.

Left-click a column label to select the entire column, or a row label to select an entire row.

Changing Vertical Cell Alignment

You can also define vertical alignment in a cell. In Vertical alignment, information in a cell can be located at the top of the cell, middle of the cell or bottom of the cell. The default is bottom.

To Change Vertical Alignment from the Alignment Group:

• Select a cell or range of cells.
• Click the Top Align, Center, or Bottom Align command.

Changing Text Control

Text Control allows you to control the way Excel 2007 presents information in a cell. There are two common types of Text control: Wrapped Text and Merge Cells.

The Wrapped Text wraps the contents of a cell across several lines if it's too large than the column width. It increases the height of the cell as well.

Merge Cells can also be applied by using the Merge and Center button on the Home tab.

To Change Text Control:

• Select a cell or range of cells.
• Select the Home tab.
• Click the Wrap Text command or the Merge and Center command.

If you change your mind, click the drop-down arrow next to the command, and choose Unmerge cells.

Formatting Tables

Introduction

Once you have entered information into a spreadsheet, you may want to format it. Formatting your spreadsheet can not only make it look nicer, but make it easier to use. In a previous lesson we discussed many manual formatting options such as bold and italics. In this lesson, you will learn how to use the predefined tables styles in Excel 2007 and some of the Table Tools on the Design tab.

To Format Information as a Table:

• Select any cell that contains information.
• Click the Format as Table command in the Styles group on the Home tab. A list of predefined tables will appear.

• Left-click a table style to select it.
• A dialog box will appear. Excel has automatically selected the cells for your table. The cells will appear selected in the spreadsheet and the range will appear in the dialog box.

• Change the range listed in the field, if necessary.
• Verify the box is selected to indicate your table has headings, if it does. Deselect this box if your table does not have column headings.
• Click OK. The table will appear formatted in the style you chose.

By default, the table will be set up with the drop-down arrows in the header so that you can filter the table, if you wish.

In addition to using the Format as Table command, you can also select the Insert tab, and click the Tablecommand to insert a table.

To Modify a Table:

• Select any cell in the table. The Table Tools Design tab will become active. From here you can modify the table in many ways.

You can:

• Select a different table in the Table Styles Options group. Click the More drop-down arrow to see more table styles.
• Delete or add a Header Row in the Table Styles Options group.
• Insert a Total Row in the Table Styles Options group.
• Remove or add banded rows or columns.
• Make the first and last columns bold.
• Name your table in the Properties group.
• Change the cells that make up the table by clicking Resize Table.

When you apply a table style, filtering arrows automatically appear. To turn off filtering, select the Home tab, click the Sort & Filter command, and select Filter from the list.