07/20/08

WATCH WITH PRECISION

Excel power users who employ conditional formatting, which changes the way a cell appears based on the cell's contents, are going to love Excel 2002's Watch Window. This feature comes in handy when you're debugging a worksheet and troubleshooting errors, or if you just don't want to scroll to some faraway column or row to check a value.

You can display the Watch Window by going to View | Toolbars | Watch Window. You can also view it by right-clicking any cell and selecting the Add Watch option. When you do, Excel 2002 will display a window that lists the address of the cell you added to the list, as well as the name of the workbook, the worksheet, the range name (if one exists), the current value in the cell, and the formula in the cell (if one exists).

If you want to go to one of the cells in the Watch Window, just double-click its entry. To delete an item from the Watch Window, click it once to select it and click the Delete Watch option. You can resize the Watch Window and close it at any time. The Watch Window services all workbooks.

Cells linked to other workbooks appear in the Watch Window only when the corresponding workbook is open.

Created Date: 12/19/2001  Last Reviewed: 12/19/2001  Rev. Date: