Conversely if you're checking if the sheets are exactly the same make a third sheet and in a1 type =if(sheet1!a1=sheet2!a1,0,1) and drag that formula all the way across and down the sheet. Then you can sum the sheet and you should get 0

I'm having a problem? On my main computer in my office I can't access excel help. I get a popup that says Help isn't working right now but I can access articles on the Microsoft website. I realize help (Office 2013) is an online function but I have no problem connecting to the internet.

My other computer in a different room also has excel 2013 and it has no problems connecting to help. Any ideas why one computer can access and one can't?

I hate Microsoft! After an hour on the phone with tech support they couldn't fix it. They did offer premium tech support though for $100 where they said it would be fixed. I passed.

I decided to update to Windows 10. That came with a plethora of problems since I was running Norton Anti-Virus which isn't compatible with 10. So that set me up with another hour of telephone support. They were able to disconnect the Norton but couldn't get Windows Defender to work. So now I am waiting for another callback. On the plus side with Windows 10 Excel Help works again. I hate Microsoft!

why would you want to use Excel Help? Google is a million times better.

And Microsoft Security essentials as good or better than Norton.

After another 2 hours on the phone with support I was told I needed to purchase "other" anti-virus software to get Windows 10 to work. Since I get Norton free from my internet provider I just switched everything back to Windows 8.

So I am back to where I started after and extremely frustrating experience. And yeah excel help no loner works again.

DONT ****ING USE EXCEL HELP

Why do you even need it? Really use Google. Help is actually a bit useful for more "advanced" stuff but for the basic things, you are much better off with Stackoverflow, MrExcel, etc.

I would like to divide the value in a cell by the number of populated cells in a range of cells. I've got a range in which some of the cells are blank; I want to divide by only the number of populated cells. Hope this is clear. What function would I use and how do I use that function?

You should just be able to use the COUNT function in the form: =VALUE/COUNT(Range)

So if your range was Column A and your value is in cell B1 then it would be =B1/COUNT(A:A)

=COUNTA(A:A) counts the non-zero values in column A

This is a good point, I assumed that any populated cells would be numeric. If you have things other than numbers in your "populated" cells, you'll want to use COUNTA instead.

Anybody have a way to run macros consecutively instead of in parrallel? For example if i have:

Sub test()
Call test2
Call test3
End sub

But I want test2 to finish before test3 starts. However i also want to be able to run them separately, so I dont want to call test3 at the end of test2.

Hope it makes sense

test3 shouldn't run until test2 is done, as you have it there. Only exception that comes to mind is if within test2 you are refreshing some external query and have the property set to backgroundrefresh = true.

Is there a way to copy conditional formatting from one area to another? If I try to use the format painter, nothing happens. I'm trying to show the top 3 in green/yellow/red in a column, but across lots of columns so I need to do it once for each one. =LARGE($Y$27:$Y$46, 1) etc. It isn't the end of the world that I need to type in each one three times, but it isn't great either.

Try:
=LARGE(Y$27:Y$46, 1)
and increase the range in the Conditional Format menu, that should work.

2 related issues I am having in Excel, would appreciate help with either. Thanks.

1. Select x number from a specific subset of a population. Example: There are 10k 2+2 posters and we export all users / locations to Excel. I need a formula that returns 4 random users for every state.

2. Select x % from a specific subset of a population. Example: There are 10k 2+2 posters and we export all users / locations to Excel. I need a formula that returns 20% of users for every state.

Do you need to do it automatically?

If you can stand some manual stuff, you just need a column next to each user and use =RAND(), then sort by that column.

The problem is that each action you perform will reset the value to a new random number, so you could do =RAND() for say column A in tab 'data', with usernames in column B, then copy/paste it into notepad and back so that you just get the values.

Then you can have a new tab, where A1 is LARGE('data'!A:A, 1), A2 is LARGE('data'!A:A, 2) and A3 is LARGE('data'A:A, 3). Then in B1, you do VLOOKUP(A1, 'Data'!A:B, 2, FALSE).

That gets the 3 highest random numbers (which are no longer changing) from column A of data, then it looks for which entry in column B corresponds to it.

I think we're trying to do different things here. I can get it to work column by column, but I can't find any way to copy the rules from one section to another and have those rules know which sell to refer to this time.

Or am I misunderstanding what I'm meant to do from the menu?

If you can get it to work column by column, are you doing it manually?
Because you should be able to enter that formula for cell Y27 and then extent the range in the menu to cover everything. Then it will only use the column the important part is to remove the $ for the column.

I did it the following way:


Then change the range from:


to:


And voila the result:

I am missing a piece of this.

I can pull unique usernames using RAND but I am struggling to link the username to state. Right now the VLOOKUP is just pulling states corresponding to RAND which corresponds to nothing.

What piece am I missing?

You should be able to do both 1 and 2 this way, for 2 you just need to figure out how many columns you need based on the countif for each state? Its not completely automatic in that its not just going to auto return 20% of the names, but it should be do-able in like 2 mins. Also, make sure that you sort columns A and B randomly using rand before hand such that you are getting truly randomized data.

http://i61.tinypic.com/imia28.png
What am I missing / screwing up?

Alright so this is Open Office, and the Solver tool, but I assume it's the same deal.





The problem is the Solver ain't solving anything. I'm trying to maximize the number of points, but it is just going with the first result in each of the respective ranges. I've used this tool before and it has worked in a different capacity, so there is something I'm doing wrong here.

So for instance, for QB, it has the option of any point result in the range of 229 to 256, but it stops at 229. Ditto that for WR where it has the option of 2 to whatever, and it stops at 2.

It's not actually going through cells J9:J17, changing the numbers, and trying to optimize O18. Ideas?

You need to use INDIRECT().

Yeah I was looking at that function but I wasn't quite sure how/where to use it.

Where do I want it?