Data Editing and Formatting in Calc – entering, editing and formatting data

Hello students, welcome to Kwickprep. A mark sheet full of plain numbers is hard to read. Why does a date sometimes turn into a strange number? Today we will learn to enter, edit and format data in LibreOffice Calc, so your sheets are correct and neat.

A cell can hold different types of data, and each type sits differently. Text is letters and words, like a student's name, and it sits on the left of the cell. Numbers, like marks, sit on the right. Dates are stored as numbers too, so they also sit on the right. A formula starts with an equals sign, and the cell shows its answer.

Let us enter some data. To enter data, click a cell and start typing. Press Enter to confirm and move down, or Tab to move right. If you make a mistake while typing, press Escape to cancel it. Remember that a formula must begin with an equals sign, or Calc treats it as text.

Pause and predict. In cell A one you type ten plus five, with no equals sign. In cell A two you type equals ten plus five. What does each cell show? A one shows the text ten plus five, as typed. A two shows fifteen, because the equals sign makes it a formula.

Now, editing. To change part of a cell, double-click it, or select it and press F2. You can also click inside the formula bar and edit there. If you just select a cell and type, the old content is fully replaced. Press the Delete key to clear the content of the selected cells.

These shortcut keys save a lot of time. Ctrl+C copies the selected cells. Ctrl+X cuts them, so you can move them. Ctrl+V pastes them into the new place. Ctrl+Z undoes your last action. Ctrl+Y redoes the action you just undid.

Before you edit or format, you must select cells. Click and drag the mouse to select a range. Click one cell, then Shift+click another, to select everything between them. Hold Ctrl and click to select cells that are not next to each other. Click a row number or a column letter to select the whole row or column.

Now a great time saver. The fill handle is the small square at the bottom right corner of the selected cell. Type Monday, then drag the fill handle down, and Calc fills Tuesday, Wednesday and more. Type one and two in two cells, select both, and drag to get three, four and five. Drag a formula down, and Calc copies it for every row, changing the row numbers.

You can also change the sheet's structure. Right-click a row number or column letter to insert or delete rows and columns. Drag the line between two headers to make a column wider or a row taller. Double-click that line, and the column fits its longest entry. To change a word everywhere, use Find and Replace, with Ctrl+H.

Formatting changes how data looks, not its value. Bold, with Ctrl+B, makes text thick, which suits headings. Italic, with Ctrl+I, makes text slanted. Underline, with Ctrl+U, draws a line below. The toolbar boxes change the font name and size. The font colour button changes the colour of the text.

Number formats change how a number is shown. Number with two decimals shows eighty eight point five as eighty eight point five zero. Currency adds the rupee sign when the language setting is English India. Percent multiplies by a hundred, so zero point eight five shows eighty five percent. Date formats show the same date in different styles. To choose one, right-click, and pick Format Cells.

Alignment decides where data sits inside a cell. Use the toolbar buttons for left, centre or right. Wrap text lets a long entry continue on the next line inside the same cell. Merge and Center joins several cells into one, which is perfect for a sheet title. The Alignment tab in Format Cells has all these options together.

Borders and colours make a sheet easy to read. The Borders button on the toolbar draws lines around the selected cells. The Background Color button fills cells with a colour, for example the header row. The Borders tab in Format Cells lets you choose the line style and thickness. The Clone Formatting brush copies the look of one cell to other cells.

Let us format a class mark sheet step by step. In row one, merge A one to E one and type the title in bold. In row two, type the headings and give them a light background colour. Centre the marks, and set the last column to percent format. Finally, add borders to the whole table, and save.

Now the mystery from the start. Calc stores every date as a number, counting days from a fixed start date. If the cell has a number format, you see a number like forty six thousand two hundred forty nine. To fix it, open Format Cells and choose a Date format. To remove all formatting you added, press Ctrl+M, for Clear Direct Formatting.

Let us revise what we learned today. Text aligns left, while numbers and dates align right. Edit a cell by double-clicking it, pressing F2, or using the formula bar. The fill handle continues a series and copies formulas. Format Cells sets number formats, alignment, fonts and borders. And formatting changes only the look, never the value. Now format your own mark sheet in Calc.