How to "unchain" a cell reference?

Hi!
I try to do the following:
The field A2 is linked to the upper table B2 to get the worth that is in it A3 to A4 are the same.
The fields from C1 to E4 are linked to another table (not visible) by a query depending on the worth in B2.
If i sort now the upper table by Rank the linked cells stay connected. But now A2 is connected to the upper B4. I understand that this is to maintain connections and make in many cases sense.
In this case i need to "unchain" this. I simply want Numbers to look what is in the upper table in cell B2 regardless of sorting. I have tried with absolute and relative references but it doesn't work.
In OOCalc this is possible across tables.
Can anyone give my a hint in wich way to look?
Thanks
A. Wolff

HI Alexander,
I would suggest looking at OFFSET, ROW() and COLUMN().
INDEX might also be useful.
Regards,
Barry

Similar Messages

How to "lock" a cell reference in Numbers??

HELP! I am a recent convert from Windows based machines to Apple. I am very familiar with Excel and need to figure out how to do something in Numbers....
I need to know how to lock a cell reference so that when you drag the formula down or across it keeps the same cell reference. In Excel you can do this by picking the cell and then hitting F4 to either lock the column, row or both.
Anybody out there help a newbie?? Thanks

Thanks Jerrold, I'm using them that way. My request has to do with
using them as an Absolute Reference versus a relative reference.
If I specify a header ref for a cell in a formula, when I drag that
formula to some other cells I want Numbers to treat it as absolute,
ie. as if I had said $A$5. What I am finding is that it does it's default
behaviour, ie. it is translating the formula reference to a new cell just
as it would do for a reference like A5.
ie. with header references, what is the equivalent of specifying $A$5?
($header name doesn't work ).
thx, rob

Absolute cell references with named cells?

I know how to make a cell reference absolute with numbered cells, as in $A12.
But what if the formula includes named cells, as in:
=Table 1 :: 'Electric - Tank' Annual Fuel Cost+Table 1 :: 'Electric - Tank' annual maintenance
I have tried the $ in various places, no luck so far. Please help...

I found another similar thread, and the folks there helped me figured out what I was doing wrong.
You need $ before EACH reference, both the cell's Row header AND column header. This made sense for the "old" cell label way, but the header names confused me at first. So:
=Table 1 :: $Electric Tank $Annual Fuel Cost+Table 1 :: $Electric Tank $annual maintenance

In Numbers, how can I make a cell reference a constant in a formula?

This is a basic question, but I am not sure of the answer. I am trying to calculate a previous SUM that I have by a column. But when I calculate it, it keeps looking for data in the cells after the SUM that I already have.
In other words, how can I get a constant cells value into my equation?
Any help would be great!
(In excel, I could do it just by placing $ around my cell field. Like H23 would be $H23$. THanks!)

JJ,
Numbers works exactly like Excel in this regard. To change H23 from a reference that will change if the formula is moved to a fixed cell reference, make it $H$23.
Regards,
Jerry

How do i copy a cell reference to another tab in a sheet

I need to copy a cell reference in another tab in a sheet, but do not know how..

Connect the two computers by ethernet cable, LAN or Target Disk Mode, Transferring files between two computers using FireWire, and just drag the iPhoto Library package from Mac A to Mac B.

Calc: How can I get absolute cell references in tables to work?

Hi, I'm new to Star Office, and have run into a problem in my first spreadsheet.
I have a data table in my spreadsheet.
Some cells in the table need to make calculations based on other cells in the table.
When I sort the table, however, the cell references are made to be incorrect. I expected that I could just use absolute references (e.g. $A$2) and when the table was sorted those references would be updated to refer to the new absolute location of that cell, e.g. $A$10). However, the absolute references are being left literally the same ($A$2) after the sort, making them reference a different row of data than intended. Relative references of course don't work in this situation either (I tried for thoroughness). (I thought Excel behaved the way I expected, but I just tried it in Excel 2007 and it is exhibiting the same behavior as StarOffice Calc.)
I'm also concerned, although I haven't tried it yet, about what will happen when I reference cells in this table from another table using absolute references that the same problem will exist...
So basically, I can't find a way to use absolute references to cells in a table that will persist correctly when the table is sorted. Any suggestions?
Thanks. Asa
Edited by: earthasa on Sep 20, 2007 2:37 AM
I was able to work around the problem by creating an index column in the table with a unique number for each row of data and using vlookup() to reference the correct row. If there is a more elegant solution I'm still interested :)
Edited by: earthasa on Sep 20, 2007 3:00 AM

OK. Think I've got it now thanks to looking at the short keys and searching for "Full Screen". The upper left key is "`" which looks like a grave - a slightly angled single quote. But when I look at the "Application" setting for Toggle full screen it is set to "'" - a "normal" single quote. Sure enough, if I hit the normal single quote key the toggle works.
I have not been anywhere near the hotkeys and can't imagine why anything would change it from a grave key to a single quote - especially as they look almost identical on the screen. I'm guessing that Adobe changed this (maybe only for international users?)
Anyway I now know how to toggle full screen, although it makes the "Premiere" keyboard with its big purple key for "Toggle full screen" redundant. Does make me wonder what the shortcut key of "'" or CTRL + "'" gives that I'm presumably missing since it appears to have been remapped.

How do I make the column portion of a relative cell reference change based on a separate cell

I have a relative cell reference K8 in a formula (k8/c8) and I want to obtain the column portion (K) of this relative cell reference from another cell at the top of the column this formula is in. This will make it very easy for me to change many formulas
all at once simply by changing the contents of the header cell to reflect the column that I want to reference in the original formula. For instance the other cell may contain the letter M which would then change all of the formulas to m8/c8.
I know I can change on cell and copy the formula to the other cells but then I have to do a copy and format paste to get all of my unique formatting back. The original formula frequently change with respect to the columns being measured.
Thank you...even if I can't get there from here.

Let's say that cell A1 contains the letter K, and that your formula is in a cell in row 8. You can change the formula to
=INDIRECT($A$1 & ROW()) / INDIRECT("C" & ROW())
This formula can be filled down (or up).
Regards, Hans Vogelaar (http://www.eileenslounge.com)

How to view cell reference not its text name?

One of my spreadsheets in Numbers 3.0.1 is displaying cell text descriptions when I view formulas. Somewhere there must be an option to view the alpha-numeric cell reference ID's, re: A1, A2 - etc. But, I can't find where it's hiding. Can someone please tell me where to look? Thanks.

The last reply was a while back, but since this was useful to me, and I tend to agree with SGIII about not being able to turn it off, here's what I did for my iPhone (but what a pain to have to deal with something like this.)
It's easier to do this on the Mac and then mail it out for the iPhone (mine is 5s with latest 7.) The names that will be used for cell names in formulae are the nearest row header to the left and nearest column header upwards.
Insert a new header row after any text headers you have, if any, and leave the just created one blank and hide it. Do the same for the column headers. In my case, I didn't have any row text headers so I just have one blank, hidden header. I did have column headers so I added a extra blank, hidden header beneath it.
Now, all that voluminous and, in my opinion, confusing cell naming business in formulae goes away and the actual A1-type references will appear.

How to compute cell reference?

This seemingly simple formula apparently has some Syntax Error. What is it?
=MAX(K4:(K4+$M$3))
Is there a better way to compute the cell reference I need? I want to specify the range size with a parameter (M3).
TIA!

Dick Huitema wrote:
I'm a bit surprised that it takes this separate function, OFFSET, to do this rather than just computing the value needed. I now know I didn't correctly compute the second cell for the range I wanted, but even when I do, =MAX(K4:K(4+$M$3)), the formula doesn't work.... so thanks for giving me the correct Numbers way!
=MAX(K4:K(4+$M$3))
doesn't work because the cell address K4 is essentially text, so you can't perform arithmetic operations on it or on part of it.
=MAX(INDIRECT("K4:K"&(4+$M$3)))
works because INDIRECT constructs an address by concatenating separate parts of its argument. The parts may be text, numbers, or the results of calculations. The end result is a text string that can, if properly formed, be used as an address by the function using INDIRECT() as an argument. In the example, the two parts to be concatenated are a text string ("K4:K") and the result of a numerical calculation using the number supplied (4) and the number returned from the cell addressed (for example, 6).
INDIRECT gets 6 from M3 and does the math: 4+6, returning the result, 10 to make the function read:
INDIRECT("K4:K"&10)
The concatenation operator ( & ) then creates the text string "K4:K10", Which INDIRECT returns to the the space it occupies (ie. supplies as the address for MAX
=MAX(K4:K10)
And MAX returns the result to the cell containing the formula.
Regards,
Barry

How can we get the reference of XML element on frame as soon as frame is created in Document?

Hi,
When ever we copy any text/table cells from any frame, and paste it directly on page, A new Frame is created and the pasted text is placed inside that frame.
Now to capture this frame creation, We have two possible solutions:
1) Attach Observer on Document 'kDocBoss' on IID_IHIERARCHY_DOCUMENT and it will notify on frame creation in update function.
2) Notification event on new story creation.
Now, I need to perform some changes in the newly created table, for example:
a) Need to delete XML tags from newly created frame
b) Need to perform action on table cells if any in the created frame.
But the problem is, when the event comes, I can access basic properties of frame like it's name, type etc, but it does not give me the
XML element on frame or tables in frame until the event is com pleat.
I know it's quite a specif requirement, but I guess many of you might have faced these kind of challenges, while processing the event.
Does any one has any idea how I can get the reference of XML element on frame as soon as it is created?

Hi Kapoor,
please give also others a chance, and excuse that I get up late on vacation ;-)
Anyway, I'd keep the story creation responder to recognize the copy, then combine it with an observer on the backing xml story to catch the associated XML element which is created there. Something like below:
UIDRef xmlStoryRef = Utils<IXMLUtils>()->GetBackingStore(doc);
InterfacePtr<ISubject> subject ( xmlStoryRef,IID_ISUBJECT );
subject->AttachObserver(observer,IID_IIDXMLELEMENT,observer->GetAttachIID());

Cell reference percentage problem

Hi Experts,
My scenario is like this I have two structures and I have created a cell reference for all the column in Col 1 like RF1. Now in Col2 I am writing my formula which would be like this
     Col1     Col2
Row1      RF1     RF1
Row2        RF2     (100 * RF2)/RF1
Row3        RF3          (100 * RF3) / RF1
Another option is I could use RF1 A% RF2
But the problem I am facing is the moment I use two reference in a formula I am getting a blank result.
Please suggest how do I go about.
Thanks.
Points shall be awarded 

Are you working on some finance reports, where in you have to compute figures like Operating cost / net sales.
also, please let me know if you get an answer to this q, as i too am looking for a similar problem.
Kind Regards

How to name a cell

omg the most basic thing and I cant find it anywhere...how to name a cell? Instead opf refering to a cell as "a9", I would like to refer to it as "total"

Generally you can't name cells in Numbers. That being said... you can enable a feature in preferences for Numbers call "Use header cell names as references":
If you enable this then when you assign a row header and column header you can refer to cells as the combination of the corresponding row and column header name. e.g.
Most of us do not use this feature but I cannot think of specific reasons why. I hope this helps

Cell References Changed when saving? (SFTGlobalID_)

I'm using IF( formulas to create an inventory control database. On a list of raw food materials, a "unit count" cell references a production schedule (PS) for 20 or so different recipes made on seperate sheets. The production schedule for each item is a 1, 2, 3 , or 4 (for batch size). The TRUE part of the formula references a value for each ingredient on each recipe and the FALSE returns nothing. Here's an example:
IF(PS :: B2=1,Recipe :: B4,)+IF(PS :: B2=2,Recipe :: B4*2,)+IF(PS :: B2=3,Recipe :: B4*3,)+IF(PS :: B2=4,Recipe :: B4*4,).....etc. for each ingredient on the recipe. (False only needs to return a zero value, as a summation of each value is built in)
I'm sure this isn't the most efficient way to do this but but it works great. However, I made it about 70% of the way through and one of my longer formulas changed all it's cell references to "SFTGlobalID_6C93D7876E0345C39D25C499A3FD1D04" after saving. I have no idea if the formula still works because now I'm over the max charcter limit for a cell.
I tried re-entering the formula with no luck and all of the other formulas work perfectly.
I believe I can work around this by splitting the workload to 2 or more cells, so it isn't necessarily detrimental to the success of the program.
I'm mainly curious as to WHY this happened. I was no where near the character limit before saving.
I've checked other discussions and answers seem to only offer shorter solutions to formulas, and not a reason for the change to begin with.
Does anyone have any idea what the cause of this could be? Any input would be greatly appreciated!
NOTE: I'm not at all opposed to a different approach but my curiosity is getting the best of me here.
Thanks in advance!!
-Dan

Jerry,
Thanks again. I noticed that Choose seemed sort of limited when looking into it, though still useful.
Right now I'm looking for a way to calculate batch size already given the amount of a prep item I need.
For example:
We use a red sauce in our meals. The inventory will tell me how many quarts I need for the week, and I need it to calculate how many batches are needed and send the amount of ingredients needed for that sauce back to the inventory. One batch is 6.5 qts.
If I need 28 qts of Red Sauce for the week, I need the program to put a 5 in the batch size cell (32.5 qt. yield - we don't make partial batches of anything, so I can't simply use division ). Then I'll just multiply the batch size cell times each ingredient used for a single batch to get the total. Any ideas?
I was thinking more IF( functions with inequalities but I'm guessing there is a better way.
Dan

Problem entering formula for Cell Reference in Query

Hi,
In a query, I need to enter a formula in a cell reference
1.
Following instructions on Help.sap, I was supposed to In Query Designer, choose View ® Cells from the menu bar to reach the functions of the cell definition
I could not see these options, BUT, I saw an icon called Cell Reference.
Is that the way? Why this difference with the instruction?
2.
While following cell reference icon, I saw my rows and columns and I wanted to put a formula at the intersection of the row, Product A and the column, YTD Adjusted Amount.
The formula is as follows:
(reference_cell_30 > 0 ) * reference_cell_30
When I entered ( .i.e. the parenthesis in the formula box it was ok but it wont allow me to enter the rest of the formula.
What could be wrong?
What is the best approach to make the entries?
Also, in this IDES test case, is reference_cell_30 referring to a cell as in MS Excel cells?
Thanks in advance

HI Amanda,
No we can't treat Rows as one structure and columns as second structure....can u send screen shot of u r Query designer [email protected]..will get back to u how a structure looks like...
unless and ubtil u have structures in u r Query,cell definition cant be enabled...
regards

In fact it's about mac:excel, how convert in a cell a number written in text format into a value?

in fact it's about mac:excel8 or 11 in OSX10.7.4,
how convert in a cell a number written in text format into its value?
cheers francois

Hi francois,
If I copyone of them and do a past special/value, it does not work.
Try just Paste instead of Paste Special > Value
I know your question is about Excel, but this works in Numbers:
Copy 1 234 567 (with spaces) and Paste (not Paste Special) into a Cell in a Numbers Table. The result is 1234567 and it behaves as a number. A formula will consider it to be a number:
You asked Wayne: what do you mean by "to reference a cell" ??
The reference is from Cell A2 to Cell A1 through a formula, such as: =A1+1
Regards,
Ian.

How to "unchain" a cell reference?

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for