Guidelines for sorting and filtering data by color Excel 2007
Author: mety Labels:: Guidelines for sorting and filtering data by color Excel 2007
Sorting and filtering data by color is a new feature in Microsoft Office Excel 2007
Sorting and filtering data, along with conditionally formatting data, are integral parts of data analysis and can help you answer questions such as the following:
You sort data to quickly organize your data and to find the data that you want. You filter data to display only the rows that meet criteria that you specify and hide rows that you do not want displayed, for one or more columns of data. You conditionally format data to help you visually explore and analyze data, detect critical issues, and identify patterns and trends. Together, sorting, filtering, and conditionally formatting data can help you and your users make more effective decisions based on your data. Using Office Excel 2007, you can sort and filter by format, including cell color and font color, whether you have manually or conditionally formatted the cells. You can also sort and filter by an icon set that you created through a conditional format. Use an icon set to annotate and classify data into three to five categories that are separated by a threshold value. Each icon represents a range of values. For example in the following table of icon sets, 3 Arrows icon set, the green arrow that points upward represents higher values, the yellow sideways arrow represents middle values, and the red arrow that points downward represents lower values. Table of icon sets
In general, the conditional formatting feature has been greatly expanded in Office Excel 2007. You can: format cells by using a two-color scale, three-color scale, data bars, and icon sets; format cells that contain specific text, number, date or time values, top or bottom ranked values, above or below average, unique, or duplicate values; and create many rules and manage rules more easily. Using color effectively when analyzing dataAlmost everyone likes colors. The effective use of color in any document can dramatically improve the document's attractiveness and readability. Good use of color and icons in your Excel reports improves decision making by helping to focus users' attention on critical information and by helping users visually understand results. Good use of colors can provide a positive emotional feeling right from the start. On the other hand, bad use of color can distract users, and even cause fatigue if over-used. The following sections provide guidelines to help you make good use of colors, and to avoid bad use of colors. More about document themes With Office Excel 2007, it is easy to create consistent themes, and add custom styles and effects. Much of the thought that is required to combine colors effectively has already been done for you by the use of predefined document themes that use attractive color schemes. You can quickly and easily format an entire document to give it a professional and modern look by applying a document theme. A document theme is a set of formatting choices that includes a set of theme colors, a set of theme fonts (including heading and body text fonts), and a set of theme effects (including lines and fill effects). Find links to more information about themes in the See Also section. Use standard colors and limit the number of colorsWhen you sort and filter by color, you might choose colors that you prefer, and the results may look good to you. But, a critical question that needs to be asked is, "Do your users prefer and see the same colors?" Your computer is capable of displaying 16,777,216 colors in 24-bit color mode. However, most users can only distinguish a tiny fraction of these colors. Furthermore, color quality can vary on computers. Room lighting, paper quality, screen and printer resolution, and browser settings all can be different. Up to 10% of the population has some difficulty distinguishing and seeing some colors. These are important variables that you probably don't have control over. But you do have control over such variables as color choice, the number of colors, and the worksheet or cell background. By making good choices based on fundamental research, you can help make your colors communicate the correct message and interpretation of your data. You can also supplement colors with icons and legends to help ensure that users understand your intended meaning. Consider color contrast and backgroundIn general, use colors with a high color saturation, such as bright yellow, medium green, or dark red. Make sure that the contrast is high between the background and the foreground. For example, use a white or gray worksheet background with cell colors, or a white or gray cell color with a font color. If you must use a background color or picture, make the color or picture as light as possible so that the cell or font color is not washed out. If you are relying just on font color, consider increasing the size of the font or setting the font in bold. The larger the font, the easier it is for a user to see or distinguish the color. If necessary, adjust or remove the banding or rows or columns because the banding color might interfere with the cell or font color. All of these considerations go a long way towards helping all users correctly understand and interpret color. Avoid using color combinations that might decrease the color visibility or confuse the viewer. You don't want to inadvertently create eye-popping art or an optical illusion. Consider using a cell border to distinguish problematic colors, such as red and green, if it is unavoidable to prevent the colors from being next to each other. Use complementary and contrasting colors to enhance contrast, and avoid using similar colors. It pays to know the basic color wheel and how to determine similar, contrasting, and complementary colors.  A similar color is one next to another color on the color wheel (for example, violet and orange are similar colors to red). A contrasting color is three colors away from a color (for example, blue and green are contrasting colors to red). Complementary colors are opposite each other on the color wheel (for example, blue-green is the complementary color of red).If you have time, test out your colors, run them by a few colleagues, try them out in different lighting conditions, and experiment with different computer screen and printer settings. Tip If you print the document in color, double-check the cell color and cell font for readability. If the cell color is too dark, consider using a white font to improve readability.
Choosing the best colors for your needs
The Top 10 colorsWhen you sort and filter data by color, use the following table to help you decide which colors to choose. These colors provide the most dramatic contrast, and, in general, are the easiest for most people to distinguish. You can easily apply these colors to cells and fonts by using the Fill Color or Font Color buttons in the Font group on the Home tab. Using colors that naturally convey meaningWhen reading financial data, numbers are either in the red (negative) or in the black (positive). A red color conveys meaning because it is an accepted convention. If you want to highlight negative numbers, then red is a top color choice. Depending on what type of data that you have, you may be able to use specific colors because they convey meaning to your audience, or perhaps there is an accepted standard for their meaning. For example:
Walking through some examplesLet us say that you are preparing a set of reports on product descriptions, pricing, and inventory levels. The following sections illustrate questions that you typically ask about this data, and how you can answer each question by using color and icon sets. Sample DataThe following sample data is used in the examples. To copy the data to a blank workbook, do the following:
What are the different types of product packaging?Problem You want to find out the different types of containers for your products, but there is no Container column. You can use the Quantity Per Unit column to manually color each cell, and then sort by color. You can also add a legend to clarify to the user what each color means. Results Solution
Which products have a markup above 67% or below 34%?Problem You want to quickly see the highest and lowest markup values at the top of the report. Results Solution
Which products need to be reordered right away?Problem You want to quickly generate a report of products that must be reordered right away, and then mail the report to your staff. Results Solution
Which products have the highest and lowest prices and costs?Problem You want to see the highest and lowest prices and costs grouped together at the top of the report. Results Solution
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How to save the sample data as a .xlsx file
