Datasheet

Performing Inexact Searches
If you have a large worksheet with lots of data, locating what you’re looking for can be dif-
ficult. The Excel Find and Replace dialog box is a useful tool for locating information, and
it has a few features that many users overlook.
Access the Find and Replace dialog box by choosing Home Editing Find & Select
Find (or pressing Ctrl+F). If you’re replacing information, you can use Home Editing
Find & Select Replace (or Ctrl+H). The only difference is which of the two tabs is dis-
played in the dialog box. Figure 19-1 shows the Find and Replace dialog box after clicking
the Options button, which expands the dialog box to show additional options.
Figure 19-1: The Find and Replace dialog box, with the Find tab selected.
In many cases, you want to locate “approximate” text. For example, you may be trying to
find data for a customer named Stephen R. Rosencrantz. You can, of course, search for the
exact text: Stephen R. Rosencrantz. However, there’s a reasonably good chance that the
search will fail. The name may have been entered differently, as Steve Rosencrantz or S.R.
Rosencrantz, for example. It may have even been misspelled as Rosentcrantz.
The most efficient search for this name is to use a wildcard character and search for
st*rosen* and then click the Find All button. In addition to reducing the amount of text
that you enter, this search is practically guaranteed to locate the customer, if the record is
in your worksheet. The search may also find some records that you aren’t looking for, but
that’s better than not finding anything.
The Find and Replace dialog box supports two wildcard characters:
? matches any single character.
* matches any number of characters.
Wildcard characters also work with values. For example, searching for 3* locates all cells
that contain a value that begins with 3. Searching for 1?9 locates all three-digit entries
that begin with 1 and end with 9.
Tip 19: Performing Inexact Searches
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