1.2 Opening an Excel file

Excel stores the data in files that contain one or multiple worksheets. When you open a worksheet by double-clicking the Excel icon, it will usually display the data contained in the last active sheet.

  • Download the file: JC Electrics template. JC Electrics is a company manufacturing heavy machinery, such as generators, electric motors and transformers.
  • Click on File, then Open and navigate to the folder in which you saved this file and open the file by double-clicking it.
  • Navigate to the first sheet, labelled ‘JC Electrics 1’.

You should now see quarterly data of units sold for JC Electrics in four columns. The screenshot below shows a spreadsheet with these columns labelled as: ‘Quarter’, ‘Generators’, ‘Transformers’ and ‘Electric Motors’.

A spreadsheet that displays the quarterly data of units sold for JC Electrics
Figure 3 Data in Excel

OpenLearn - Data analysis: visualisations in Excel
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