For all the great things about Excel, one of the most confusing things is how it stores and displays data.

Every cell has a number format, which can be selected from the dropdown in the Home ribbon tab. However, it is common practice to leave it on the default option General, as this automatically adapts to the value.

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Excel is the behemoth of the spreadsheet kingdom. Across the length and breadth of every nation, it reigns supreme. As the market leader, the program has enjoyed a long stranglehold on its competition since dethroning the now-defunct Lotus 1–2–3 in 1995.

Despite its monopolistic dominance, others haven’t given up. Alternatives include Apple Numbers, LibreOffice Calc, Zoho Sheet and Quip Spreadsheets.

The one I wanted to focus on though is Google Sheets.

My first real experience of Sheets was at university in 2012, where I recall using it for a group assignment that was part of my web development degree. …

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Did you know your Excel calculations can be affected by filtering tables or hiding rows?

It’s one of those questions you may well answer with an emphatic yes. But if I dig beneath the surface, I know many of you wouldn’t be able to tell me the difference between the SUM, SUBTOTAL and AGGREGATE functions, a 9 and a 109, or a 4 and a 5.

If that sounded like gobbledygook, don’t worry, because all will be clear by the end.

When you work with numeric table data in Excel, there’s a good chance you’ll want to perform a calculation…

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It’s fair to say that Excel formulas are becoming like a programming language. Over the past couple of years, Microsoft has fundamentally changed Excel’s calculation engine and introduced a set of functions that allow us to construct formulas to do much more with less.

It doesn’t stop there.

If you are familiar with programming languages, you’ll know what a lambda is. It’s an anonymous function that is passed as an argument or returned from a function call. Well, now that very concept has made its way to Excel.

I am going to introduce to you the new LAMBDA function—which at…

Italy clinched their second European Championship title last Sunday after beating England in the Euro 2020 final on penalties.

It was the same old story for the Three Lions, who have now lost seven of their last nine penalty shootouts in major international tournaments.

To add to the misery, it means that 55 years without winning a trophy continues.

Anyway…earlier I posted an article about a Euro 2020 Stats Tracker I created in Google Sheets. If you haven’t already: have a read, download it, and play around.

I wanted to pick out a few interesting insights from the tournament and…

Euro 2020 reached its finale on Sunday, with Italy crowned winners after defeating England (my nation!) in a penalty shootout. It meant the Three Lions’ 55 barren years without a major international trophy continues.

Yesterday was a sombre day, as we mourned, reflected and regretted what might have been the night before. Now though, it’s time to look back on—what still was—a wonderful tournament.

Allegiances aside — perhaps you’re a football statistical anorak who is curious about the numbers behind the tournament, or a spreadsheet fanatic who is interested in seeing the inner workings of a stats-based system.

Or maybe…

55 years of hurt did not end last night, but it could go a long way to doing so, as England beat Germany 2–0 in the biggest international match Wembley has hosted since its reopening in 2007.

Second-half goals from Raheem Sterling and Harry Kane wrapped up the victory for the Three Lions, who have now kept six consecutive clean sheets and conceded just once in 10 matches.

It means a quarter-final tie beckons against Ukraine, who hours later beat Sweden 2–1 after extra time.

An eruption of joy, ecstasy and elation poured out from players and fans as the…