Customer Reviews

Running Microsoft Excel 97

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book covers all the features of EXCEL'97 in detail. It begins at the beginning (What is a toolbar?)and goes on to Visual Basic. The main drawback of a book of this type is that it concentrates on describing features one after the other. Like reading a dictionary, knowing a lot of words doesn't mean you are developing fluency.

An exception to this remark is the last chapter in the book "Sample Visual Basic Application". I'm a novice in this area, so experts might not agree with me. But I found this example really got my imagination. It describes a project that picks up data from an outside monitoring station on a regularly updated basis, puts it into EXCEL, generates a regularly updated chart, and makes a report using WORD. The entire sequence is automatic. This example puts EXCEL to work with other applications in a complex project showing me what is possible. Variations on this theme could be used for many other projects.

Sometimes the Microsoft book is good and sometimes it isn't- this time it's the best. The book is a catalog of everything, with clear instructions. There's no need to read it cover to cover, though that will give you lots of ideas for what can be done. Just look in the index when you need something and flip back to the clear instructions and helpful illustrations. The book's pretty hefty, so the included book-on-CD is the best way to tote it around as a reference. Keep the CD at work for surreptitious reference and be the office Excel expert!

I will now have to check my credit card statement to see if I was charged for a book I ordered that I never received ! Buyers beware !

This book covers all the features of EXCEL 97 very clearly with good examples.

Unfortunately the support page for the WEB material has gone ...END

In my work as a technical editor, I've had reason to review many of the other 800+-page books available on Excel 97. This one stands out, far and away, as the top reference available. It covers more than any of the other titles, and does so more thoroughly. For example, this is the only book I've found that covers creating custom numeric formats.