Overview of Microsoft Office Excel 2007download.microsoft.com/.../Excel2007ProductGuide.docx ·...

Microsoft Office Excel 2007

September 2006

Table of Contents

MICROSOFT OFFICE EXCEL 2007......................................................................I

OVERVIEW OF MICROSOFT OFFICE EXCEL 2007................................................1Create Better Spreadsheets............................................................................................1Improve Spreadsheet Analysis........................................................................................2Share Information with Customers and Partners.............................................................3Manage Information More Effectively..............................................................................4

CREATE BETTER SPREADSHEETS.....................................................................5

Enhanced Interface with More Room to Work.....................................................................5Microsoft Office Fluent User Interface..............................................................................5Increased Spreadsheet Row and Column Capacity..........................................................6Faster Performance.........................................................................................................6

Support for Tables..............................................................................................................6Enhanced Table Tools......................................................................................................6New Formulas and Range Management Tools.................................................................8

Professional Charting Tools.................................................................................................9Quick Formatting Tools for Faster Results.......................................................................9Dramatic Visual Effects in Charts.....................................................................................9Shared Charting Engine Across the Microsoft Office System...........................................9

Custom Data Output Tools................................................................................................10Faster Formatting with Cell Styles.................................................................................10Editing Report Headers and Footers..............................................................................11Improved Printing Experience........................................................................................11Customization with Microsoft Office Art and Styles........................................................11

IMPROVE SPREADSHEET ANALYSIS................................................................13

Rich Data Visualization with Conditional Formatting.........................................................13Rules Manager...............................................................................................................14

Improved Sorting and Filtering.........................................................................................15

Easy-to-Use PivotTable and PivotChart Views...................................................................17Accessible and Visually Enhanced Tools........................................................................17

Quick Access to Current Business Data............................................................................19

www.microsoft.com/office/excel

SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services................................................................................19Role of PivotTable and PivotChart Views in SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services............20Benefits of the Field List................................................................................................20

SHARE INFORMATION WITH CUSTOMERS AND PARTNERS...............................22

Accessible, Browser-Based Data.......................................................................................22Dynamically Render a Spreadsheet in HTML.................................................................22High Fidelity Between the Excel Client and a Spreadsheet............................................23Dashboards Created from Spreadsheets.......................................................................23Excel Services API..........................................................................................................24

Support for New File Formats...........................................................................................24Office XML Formats........................................................................................................24Support for XPS and PDF...............................................................................................24

MANAGE INFORMATION MORE EFFECTIVELY..................................................25

Server-Based Control........................................................................................................25Data Connection Library................................................................................................25Report Management Features.......................................................................................26Publish to Office SharePoint Server 2007......................................................................27Create a Review or Approval Workflow..........................................................................28

Content Management Options..........................................................................................29Finishing Documents.....................................................................................................30Information Rights Management...................................................................................30Records Management....................................................................................................30Information Management Policies..................................................................................31Enabling Content Policies..............................................................................................31

SUMMARY....................................................................................................32

RESOURCES.................................................................................................33

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS...............................................................................34

www.microsoft.com/office/excel

Overview of Microsoft Office Excel 2007Welcome to Microsoft® Office Excel® 2007 spreadsheet software, included in the 2007 release of the Microsoft Office system. The Microsoft Office system, an integrated system of programs, servers, and services for information workers, provides an even more accessible and comprehensive set of tools for people who rely on working with information efficiently and productively.

Office Excel 2007 is a powerful tool to create and format spreadsheets and to analyze and share information to make more informed decisions. With the Microsoft Office Fluent™ user interface, it’s easier to create and use rich data visualization, PivotTable® views, and professional-looking charts. When Office Excel 2007 is used with Microsoft Office SharePoint® Server 2007, you can take advantage of Excel Services—a new, server-based version of Excel that is optimized for managing, consuming, and sharing spreadsheets.

Ecma Office Open XML Formats reside at the heart of the new Microsoft Office system. A compact and robust file format, Office XML Formats allow for better data integration between documents and back-end systems. Also, with Excel XML Formats, you can reduce file sizes, improve data recovery, and increase the interoperability of your spreadsheets with other data sources such as line-of-business systems.

Create Better Spreadsheets

The Office Fluent user interface and new and improved capabilities makes it easier and faster to create effective spreadsheets that are ready to be shared or printed.

New! The Office Fluent user interface presents the right tools when you need them most.

New! Increased spreadsheet row and column capacity of one million rows by 16,000 columns enables you to import and work with massive amounts of data and achieve faster calculation performance with support for dual or multi-core processors.

Improved! Support for working with tables of data helps you create and format a table with a rich table styles gallery. Column headings remain in view as you scroll, and auto-fill populates and expands any table automatically.

www.microsoft.com/office/excel 1

New! Fast formatting with Cell Styles helps you assemble a great-looking report faster, with fewer clicks.

Improved! Formulas authoring experience includes a resizable formula bar and context-based Formula AutoComplete—so that you can write the proper formula syntax the first time, every time. You can also refer to named ranges and tables within formulas and functions.

New! Chart Formatting tools help you create and format professional-looking charts with greater ease using fewer clicks.

New! Use dramatic visual effects in charts such as 3-D, soft shadowing, anti-aliasing, and glow.

New! Shared diagramming and charting with Microsoft Office Word 2007 and Microsoft Office PowerPoint® 2007 presentation graphics program help ensure a consistent look across your spreadsheets, documents, and presentations.

New! Page Layout View for a better printing experience helps ensure that what you see on the screen is what you’ll get in printed output and that any headers and footers you add or edit are displayed in plain view.

Improved! Customization with Microsoft Office art, predefined styles, and integrated graphics help you apply a consistent, professional look to your spreadsheets that can easily be placed in other Microsoft Office system documents.

Improve Spreadsheet Analysis

New data analysis and visualization tools help you analyze information, spot trends, and access your company information more easily.

New! Conditional formatting with rich data visualization schemes helps you set conditions more easily to discover trends or patterns in your information.

Improved! Sorting and filtering helps you find the information you need, quickly and easily. Office Excel 2007 supports up to 64 levels to sort data, including the ability to sort by color.

Improved! Create a PivotTable or PivotChart® more easily by using data fields to reorient data quickly and find the answers you need.


New! Full support for Microsoft SQL Server™ 2005 Analysis Services enables you to query your most current business data by using the flexibility of Office Excel 2007.

Share Information with Customers and Partners

With Excel Services, you can share sensitive business information more broadly and securely with coworkers, customers, and business partners.

New! Dynamically render a spreadsheet in HTML and then permit others to view only the parts of a spreadsheet you want them to see by using their Web browser.

New! High fidelity between the Office Excel 2007 client and spreadsheets that are rendered using Excel Services helps you navigate, sort, filter, and interact with tables or PivotTable views from a Web browser.

New! Business dashboards can be easily created from spreadsheets to track key performance indicators (KPIs), and then you can share these broadly through a Web browser.

New! Support for PDF and XML Paper Specification (XPS) file formats helps you convert your spreadsheets into a fixed file format for easier sharing.*

* You can save as a PDF or XPS file from a 2007 Microsoft Office system program only after you install an add-in. For more information, see Install and use a PDF or XPS add-in.


http://r.office.microsoft.com/r/rlidOOPDFXPSAddin?clid=1033

Manage Information More Effectively

Use Excel Services and XML file format to manage and control important business information more effectively.

New! With the Data Connection Library you can import external data into a spreadsheet by using preconfigured external sources of business information.

New! Report management features help protect confidential business information while ensuring people can view the data they need.

New! Publish to Office SharePoint Server 2007 to help prevent the spread of multiple copies of business-critical spreadsheets throughout your organization, protect sensitive business information, and ensure people are working with the most current data.

New! Excel Services application programming interface (API) enables developers to use the Office Excel 2007 powerful calculation engine in other applications, such as a Web-based mortgage calculator or an options pricing model.

New! Office XML Formats reduce file sizes, improve data recovery, and make greater data interoperability possible.

New! Permissions-based control helps you manage who can access, view, and make changes to spreadsheets stored on the server.

Office Excel 2007 in ActionSylvie Narp is the Director of Finance for Fabrikam, Inc., a manufacturing company. With 15 direct reports, each responsible for a different section of the business, she needs comprehensive, real-time visibility into the company’s financial data. Her employees need a robust yet flexible tool for analyzing data to make more informed decisions. Office Excel 2007 offers a comprehensive solution.


Create Better SpreadsheetsOrganizing and working with large amounts of data can be a challenging task. In previous versions of Excel, row and column capacity limits made it difficult to analyze large amounts of data. Some of the most advanced tools and capabilities were contained in menus and sub-menus, forcing users to find these commands on their own. Creating and working with tables is one of the most fundamental reasons people use Excel, yet using tables could be challenging. Beyond simply creating or formatting a table, there was no way to refer to the table data intelligently. Building and formatting charts was “click-intensive,” and even the most common tasks, like changing a chart’s title, could be difficult. When you were ready to print your spreadsheet, it was difficult to know what the output would look like before doing so. Furthermore, it was hard to know where a page break might occur, which led to multiple, frustrating printing attempts that wasted resources.

Office Excel 2007 addresses these challenges by helping you format business information clearly and easily. Professional-looking reports and charts are now simple to create, so you do not have to depend on an external design firm to get the look you want. When you are ready to print, the Office Excel 2007 Page Layout View helps to ensure better printed results.

Enhanced Interface with More Room to Work Office Excel 2007 takes advantage of the Office Fluent user interface to make powerful productivity tools easily accessible. It also offers more room to work and delivers faster performance.

Microsoft Office Fluent User Interface

With the Office Fluent user interface of the Microsoft Office system, Office Excel 2007 presents the appropriate tools at the right time so that you can produce your best work more quickly. Important features are organized and presented in context. For example, when you are writing a formula to calculate a value, Office Excel 2007 displays the Formulae tab and toolset to help you in your selection. Or, when you are working with a


table and you need help choosing the right format, the Office Excel 2007 intuitive table galleries show you how a table will look before you make your final selection.

Increased Spreadsheet Row and Column Capacity

Office Excel 2007 delivers greater spreadsheet capacity—1 million rows by 16,000 columns—to facilitate working with massive amounts of data. You no longer have to use many different spreadsheets to support your data.

To support a bigger grid, Office Excel 2007 increases several other limits. For example, the number of rows allowed in a PivotTable chart increased from 64,000 to over 1 million, and the amount of memory that Excel can use increased from 1 GB to the maximum allowed by Microsoft Windows®, while the limit on the number of rows of a column or columns that can be referred to in an array formula was completely eliminated.

Faster Performance

To a large number of customers, the calculation speed of Excel is extremely important—perhaps the most important “feature.” Calculations in large, formula-intensive spreadsheets are now faster than before with the Office Excel 2007 support for dual processors. Office Excel 2007 spots formulas that can be calculated concurrently, and then runs those formulas on multiple processors simultaneously (this capability is called “multithreaded calculation”). The net effect is that a given spreadsheet finishes calculating in less time, improving overall calculation performance.

Support for Tables Office Excel 2007 helps you quickly construct, format, and expand tables using the Ribbon and the table gallery.

Enhanced Table Tools

It is now easier to create tables. Enhancements in Office Excel 2007 help you assemble data into a table with just a few clicks. When you need to expand the table to accommodate more data, Office Excel 2007 quickly expands the table using the proper format.

Simply click in the range of cells you want to format as a table, click Format as Table in the Ribbon (on the Home tab), and select your favorite table style. Office Excel 2007


applies the table style to your range of cells and automatically labels column headings, creates AutoFilters, and displays other relevant tools. Column headers stay in view when you scroll through large tables, making it easier for your team members, auditors, or customers to follow your analysis more easily.

Figure 22: Creating a table

You can quickly modify the format and appearance of a table by using the Table Gallery feature in Office Excel 2007. Some of the designer-quality formatting options include banded rows and columns for identifying key data or highlighting the last column of a table. You can see a live preview of your selection before making the final changes.


Figure 23: Table tools

Office Excel 2007 in ActionSusan is one of Sylvie’s analysts. She is preparing a sales performance report for senior management. Even though she is working with a large amount of data, she can easily assemble the data into a table in just a few clicks. She can change the look of the table quickly by using the Table Gallery, previewing her selection before she chooses the final look. When she needs to write formulae on data from the table, Office Excel 2007 provides an intelligent way to reference this information by column heading name—instead of an arbitrary cell reference. This helps Susan to write her formula more easily and permits others to follow the logic of her spreadsheet when she shares it.

New Formulas and Range Management Tools

Office Excel 2007 offers robust tools for working with formulas and ranges, including:

A resizable formula bar that prevents long, complex formulae from spilling over onto your spreadsheet.

Formula AutoComplete, which helps you write the proper formula syntax the first time—every time.


Structured referencing that helps you refer to tables and ranges while writing formulas.

Name Manager, which helps you organize, update, and manage multiple name ranges from a central location.

Professional Charting ToolsWhether you are compiling a report for auditors or charting internal business data, Office Excel 2007 simplifies the process and helps you achieve more professional-looking results.

Quick Formatting Tools for Faster Results

The Office Fluent user interface offers charting tools to help you:

Create professional-looking charts in just a few clicks. Format your chart with the Chart Layout and Chart Styles galleries, or manually

format each component, such as axes, titles, and other chart labels.

Dramatic Visual Effects in Charts

Adding special effects to your charts can help you communicate your analysis more clearly. You can use stunning effects such as 3-D, soft shadowing, and anti-aliasing to help identify key data trends and create more compelling graphical summaries.

Shared Charting Engine Across the Microsoft Office System

The improved charting capabilities in Office Excel 2007 are shared across the Microsoft Office system, which means that you can create and interact with charts the same way—regardless of the program you are using. For example, if you want to add a chart to a report in Office Word 2007, you can take advantage of the same tools you would use in Office Excel 2007 to modify and format the chart.


Figure 24: Charting tools

Office Excel 2007 in ActionOffice Excel 2007 provides the tools to conduct sophisticated data analysis and convey that information in easy-to-read charts. When Carol Philips, Fabrikam Inc.’s senior product marketing manager, needs some charts for an important investor presentation, she works with Sylvie and Susan. Susan imports key financial data from the previous fiscal year into a spreadsheet, highlights relevant sections, and displays the results in a series of compelling, three-dimensional charts that contain shadowing and other rich effects. All of the charting tools are clearly visible from the Office Fluent user interface, so the entire process takes far less time. Susan does not need to navigate through different toolbars or dialog boxes to label her chart title or axes properly.

Custom Data Output ToolsOffice Excel 2007 offers new tools for creating custom effects and styles. This feature, together with tools that you can use to view a spreadsheet exactly as it appears in print format, helps workers of all skill levels to produce professional-looking spreadsheets.

Faster Formatting with Cell Styles

Cell Styles offer visual previews of how a cell might look with format enhancements, so you can modify the look of a report with fewer clicks.


Editing Report Headers and Footers

By using the new Page Layout View that displays headers and footers in plain view, you can quickly change the title of your report or add additional details at the bottom of each page in the footer.

Improved Printing Experience

With the new Page Layout View, you can see exactly how a spreadsheet will print. By changing the spreadsheet’s orientation from Portrait to Landscape, you might prevent your spreadsheet from being truncated when you print.

Figure 25: Page Layout View

Customization with Microsoft Office Art and Styles

Customization with Microsoft Office art, predefined styles, and integrated graphics help you quickly apply a consistent, professional look to your spreadsheets that can easily be placed in other Microsoft Office system documents. You can apply these or other predefined styles to any spreadsheet.


Improve Spreadsheet AnalysisWhen working with large amount of data, people usually struggle to discover patterns or trends or to reorder the data to make more informed decisions. PivotTable views—a powerful tool for reorienting large amounts of data to answer different questions—were difficult to create, putting them out of reach for all but the most advanced Excel users.

The enhancements in Office Excel 2007 address these challenges. Office Excel 2007 offers powerful analytical tools to help you discern trends from complex data. By analyzing information effectively, you can gain business insight and make more informed decisions.

Rich Data Visualization with Conditional FormattingYou can now discover and illustrate important trends and highlight exceptions in your data by using conditional formatting with rich visualization schemes. You can apply conditional formatting more easily and identify trends by using colored gradients, data bars, and icons.

Greater Than…and Less Than…: Enables you to create value-based rules like Greater Than, Less Than, Between, Equal To, or Text That Contains.

Top/bottom rules: Enable you to format differently the top/bottom x (or x%) items.

Data Bars: By default, when you apply data bars with one click via the Ribbon, Excel uses the highest and lowest values in the range to draw the shortest and longest bar. You can further tweak the color of the data bar or the way Excel computes the values for the shortest and longest bar by selecting More Options.

Color Scales: Enables you to create a two-color or three-color scale rule using default colors. When you apply color scales with one click, Excel uses the lowest, highest, and midpoint values in the range to determine the color scales. You can change the colors or the way Excel determines the values for the highest, lowest, or midpoint values by selecting More Options.


Icon Sets: Enables you to create a conditional formatting rule with three-icon, four-icon, or five-icon icon sets of your choice. The most commonly used icons are exposed here; by default, Excel uses percentiles to calculate the break between icon sets. You can change the icons or the way Excel determines the values for the icon sets, as well as pick from further icon sets, by selecting More Options.

Figure 26: Conditional formatting icon sets

Rules Manager

Use the Rules Manager to work with conditional formatting when you need to:

View existing rules. You can view the rule condition, the range it is applied to, and the format set on the rule. The Show Formatting Rules for drop-down menu at


the top of the dialog box enables you to change the scope of the rules you are looking at. You can view rules for the selected cells, the current worksheet, the current table, other worksheets in the book, other tables in the workbook, or the entire workbook.

Add new rules via the New Rule button. Change the order in which rules are evaluated. This is done using the UP ARROW

and DOWN ARROW keys. Edit existing rules via the Edit Rule button. The Edit Rule UI is the same as the

New Rule UI. Delete rules via the Delete Rule button. Control whether more than one rule can evaluate to true.

Improved Sorting and FilteringSorting and filtering are two of the most important types of basic analysis that you can do with data. New options for sorting and filtering make Office Excel 2007 the ideal tool for working with large amounts of complex data. You can:

Select any number of items for filter conditions with multi-select in AutoFilters. Sort or filter by the background color of cells. Filter by applying “quick filters” for specific data types (for example, filter by

quarter, month, or year for a date column). Reapply a set of filters with one button click. Manage up to 64 sorting levels from a central location.


Figure 27: Enhanced filtering and sorting


Office Excel 2007 in ActionAfter organizing her data into a table, Susan is still having difficulty perceiving how the numbers are trending. By using conditional formatting, she can illustrate these conditions in a more intuitive way. For example, by applying a three-color gradient to Fabrikam Inc.’s 2005 results, Susan creates a financial “heat map” that tells her the areas that demand her attention, as the higher values are now depicted in green. She quickly pinpoints that product sales were particularly strong in the Northeast Region. With the ability of Office Excel 2007 to sort by color, Susan can better identify the states in which the highest sales volume occurred, and then share this insight with Sylvie during their next meeting.

Easy-to-Use PivotTable and PivotChart Views Office Excel 2007 offers new tools for creating and working with PivotTable views and PivotChart views that make it easy to ask multiple questions about a given data set. With enhanced context menus, contextual tool tips, and new layout and design options, these features can expose this advanced tool to even more people.

Accessible and Visually Enhanced Tools

Information workers of varying skill levels can now create a PivotTable or PivotChart in a few simple steps. Whether you are working with local data or accessing back-end data (such as a SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services cube), all you need to decide is which fields to display as rows, which fields to display as columns, and which fields to display as values and in what form (values can be displayed as sum, averages, or other calculations).


Figure 28: Creating a PivotTable

By using the PivotTable Field List, you can select the fields you want to include by using a clear, side-by-side view. If you need to pose another question against your data, you can drag fields in different orders to alter the hierarchy of your information. Similar to charts, you can quickly modify the look of a PivotTable by using the chart gallery.

Local and external filtersIt is now easier to filter data in PivotTable views. Extensive improvements to filtering include:

Visible filter entry points and dialog boxes. New value filters. Date and label filters. Multi-item selection.


You can sort by various fields, such as color or compact axis, and then view your results. Use inline “drill indicators” to drill up and down on any part of the data.

Most important, you can take advantage of these features while working within a browser. Office Excel 2007 works with Excel Services so that you can interact with a PivotTable smoothly—whether you are working with Office Excel 2007 on a desktop or in a Web browser.

Improved design and layoutEnhancements to the layout of PivotTable views make them more readable and presentable. Some of the improvements to the design include:

Compact row axes that display multiple fields in one column. A flexible, in-grid layout that is suitable for all types of reporting. New style options available from the Table Gallery so you can choose a style that

is consistent with the look of your table or other aspects of your spreadsheet.

Quick Access to Current Business DataYou can now query the latest business information quickly. Office Excel 2007 offers full support for SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services, which delivers rich data consolidation, warehousing, and structure.

SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services

Smooth integration between Office Excel 2007 and SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services helps you make better use of your IT department’s existing data warehousing investments. You can now “slice” data so that you can create custom reports from relational databases and expose information such as:

Calendar year versus fiscal year, as a way to capture different views of business data over time.

“Top Sellers” as an always up-to-date, single-click selection in a spreadsheet that draws from SQL Server 2005 data.

Role of PivotTable and PivotChart Views in SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services

PivotTable and PivotChart views play a central role in the Office Excel 2007 support of SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services. SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services provides a business


semantic model, called a Unified Dimensional Model (UDM), which defines business logic, calculations, and metrics. The UDM serves as the single data source for all reports, spreadsheets, online analytical processing (OLAP) browsers, and KPIs.

Benefits of the Field List

PivotTable and PivotChart views that are connected to the UDM in SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services—instead of data in a spreadsheet—offer additional benefits that extend beyond core pivot functionality. Specifically, you gain all of the benefits of the “metadata” that is built into the UDM so that you can quickly find what you need by using the Field List.

SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services features that are exposed by the Field List include:

Separate measures, dimensions, and KPIs that have different icons. The measure group picker at the top so that you can focus on one measure group

by filtering out all dimensions that are not useful with that group. Display folders that prevent the top-level list of fields from becoming too cluttered. Attributes, which are the single fields that make up dimensions. The attributes are

exposed individually for greater flexibility.

SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services features that are not exposed but are supported by the Field List include named sets that the UDM designer can use to define subsets of items in a dimension. For example, specific customers within the Customer dimension can be added with a single click in the Field List. This is effective in cases where it would be tedious to select the individual items manually. It is also useful when the set is defined by a business rule. For instance, Top Sellers can change on a daily basis.


Figure 29: Integration with SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services


Share Information with Customers and PartnersSharing sensitive business data such as financial plans or sales reports can be challenging. Sending spreadsheets in an e-mail message can risk exposing confidential data, and it can be difficult for users with bandwidth constraints to open large spreadsheets. Furthermore, you cannot control who might view a spreadsheet, or specify that only certain sections of a larger spreadsheet can be viewed.

Office Excel 2007, combined with Excel Services, a new technology that will ship with Office SharePoint Server 2007, provides significant improvements for sharing data with greater security. You can share sensitive business information more broadly and securely with your coworkers, customers, and business partners.

Accessible, Browser-Based Data Providing universal access to spreadsheet information in a browser helps you share data more easily and securely. External users, like customers or business partners, can access and interact with your data without the ability to see formulae, macros, or other confidential business logic that might be contained in a spreadsheet.

Excel Services also gives you more control over published workbooks. You can specify particular sections that should be rendered, like a chart or table, while concealing other sections that contain confidential data.

In addition, when you publish a spreadsheet to Office SharePoint Server 2007, you can specify particular cells within a spreadsheet to be used as input cells or parameters for performing calculations in a custom application within a Web browser. This helps workers across any organization to take advantage of the same calculation model by entering their own values for the parameters.

Dynamically Render a Spreadsheet in HTML

With Excel Services you can render a spreadsheet dynamically in HTML for browser-based viewing. You can permit others to view the entire spreadsheet or only parts of it. In addition, you can help:


Ensure that any customer or partner can view the data properly—even if they do not have Office Excel 2007 or are using a previous version of the software.

Protect your company’s intellectual property that might be contained in the data, formulae, or custom-defined macros.

High Fidelity Between the Excel Client and a Spreadsheet

Excel Services renders a high-fidelity version of an Office Excel 2007 spreadsheet for viewing in a Web browser, so you can navigate, filter, sort, and interact with PivotTable views even when using a Web browser.

Figure 30: PivotTable interactivity in a Web browser

Dashboards Created from Spreadsheets

Excel Services also simplifies the process of creating Web-based dashboards from business information. You can track KPIs by using dashboards that are created from Office Excel 2007 spreadsheets, Excel Web Access, and Office SharePoint Server 2007.

Excel Services in ActionWhen the CEO asks Sylvie to prepare a series of financial dashboards to track Fabrikam Inc.’s KPIs, Web-based dashboards simplify the task. Sylvie can create a broadly accessible dashboard that reveals unit sales and product margins. Now, Fabrikam Inc.’s senior executives can monitor the health of the business more closely by using a Web browser. Sylvie also published a portion of the dashboard for her customers, giving them full access to the data while enhancing protection of the confidential data contained in the spreadsheet’s macros.


Excel Services API

The benefits of Excel Services extend beyond the end user. With the Excel Services application programming interface (API), corporate developers can take advantage of the powerful calculation engine in Excel in other applications. By using the Excel Services API, developers can control and perform other functions, such as:

Loading an Office Excel 2007 spreadsheet on the server. Changing the values in one or more cells of a spreadsheet—either by changing a

cell's value or by refreshing an external data connection—and recalculating the spreadsheet based on these new values.

Retrieving all or part of a spreadsheet for viewing or to use within a larger business process.

Support for New File FormatsOffice Excel 2007 offers support for new file formats that improve data integration, boost performance, and make it easier to share business information across platforms.

Office XML Formats

Office Excel 2007 supports the new Ecma Office XML Formats. The Excel XML Formats improve data integration between Microsoft Office system documents and back-end systems. The file formats have open, published format specifications that any technology provider can use to integrate Microsoft Office system documents into their solutions.

Because the file formats are compressed, they result in substantially smaller file sizes than with previous versions of Excel, Word, and PowerPoint, thereby reducing storage and bandwidth requirements. Segmented data storage within the file formats greatly aids in recovering corrupt documents because the corruption of any part of a document does not prevent you from opening the entire document.

Support for XPS and PDF

When you need to create a fixed version of your spreadsheet, you can now save it as an XML Paper Specification (XPS) file or Portable Document Format (PDF) file. This “locks” your data while providing a polished report for customers.


Manage Information More EffectivelyOrganizations often find it challenging to manage and control business-critical spreadsheets. Copies of spreadsheets are prevalent throughout an organization, and it can be a challenge to keep track of who has access to confidential business data. It can also be difficult to ensure whether you and your coworkers are working with the most current version of a spreadsheet.

Office Excel 2007, combined with Excel Services and Office SharePoint Server 2007, addresses these challenges to help you manage business information more effectively. By providing centralized access to a spreadsheet to a specific audience or set of users, you can help protect sensitive data by controlling viewing rights, and help ensure everyone is using the most current, accurate information.

Server-Based Control Office Excel 2007 offers server-based control that helps ensure consistency across your organization, while enabling the automatic refreshing and delivery functionality that is so often requested.

Data Connection Library

When you and your team need to access external data and import it into a spreadsheet, you no longer need to know the names of corporate data sources or call for help from IT. After your organization’s IT department has determined a set of common databases to which you need access, you can use the Data Connection Library to access these sources and import information directly into your spreadsheet—without having to provide password authentication.

In Office Excel 2007, the connections are exposed to simplify the process of creating a new external data object, such as a PivotTable or OLAP formula. A reference to the data connection file is added to the Office Excel 2007 spreadsheet. When the spreadsheet is executed in Excel Services, the server checks the connection in the library to see if it has been updated. If it has, the server updates the connection in the spreadsheet prior to refreshing the external data.


Figure 31: Data Connection Library

A Data Connection Library also simplifies the maintenance of data connections. If a connection changes, it need only be updated in the library instead of in the individual spreadsheets that are linked to the original data source.

Report Management Features

Office Excel 2007, coupled with Excel Services and Office SharePoint Server 2007, offers important report management features to help ensure people can view the data they need while enhancing protection of the underlying proprietary information.

Creating a “snapshot” of a spreadsheet. Users can now manage spreadsheets by using “snapshots.” Snapshots have the look of the original


spreadsheet, but contain only the values and formatting from that spreadsheet. Other proprietary or sensitive data (such as formulas, hidden cells, or document properties) are not available within snapshots. Snapshots allow you to share information with customers and business partners more securely—reducing concern about exposing sensitive data. They are also an ideal way for analysts to create historical views of reports for data comparisons and identifying trends.

View Item Right. One of the most important features in Office SharePoint Server 2007 is the View Item Right. This right restricts a user to executing a file on the server or gaining access to a snapshot of the values in the visible portions of a spreadsheet. The spreadsheet file in its entirety cannot be downloaded and opened on a client computer. By using the Report Library in Office SharePoint Server 2007, administrators can control who has access to the intellectual property, such as formulas and external data sources within a workbook, while still allowing users to view and interact with the data through a Web browser and in Office Excel 2007.

Publish to Office SharePoint Server 2007

Office Excel 2007 works with Excel Services and Office SharePoint Server 2007 to provide important benefits that extend beyond simply saving a file to a SharePoint document library.

Publish to "trusted" locations. Excel Services only renders files that are stored in administrator-configured folders. Excel communicates with Office SharePoint Server 2007 to publish a list of these locations specified by the IT administrator.

Publish specific pieces of a spreadsheet. When you publish a document to Office SharePoint Server 2007, you can control whether the viewer sees an entire spreadsheet, specific sheets within a spreadsheet, or charts, tables, PivotTable views, and Named Ranges within a spreadsheet.


Figure 32: Selecting which spreadsheet elements to publish to Excel Services

Create a Review or Approval Workflow

When creating spreadsheets, you can send them in an e-mail message to colleagues to gather feedback. When you need to get feedback quickly, you want to route the spreadsheet to the right people without having to go through complicated interfaces or cumbersome tools. To get feedback more quickly, you can take advantage of the review or approval workflows available from Office Excel 2007 and Office SharePoint Server 2007.

To initiate a review or approval process, select the appropriate Office SharePoint Server 2007 workflow from within Office Excel 2007. The workflow creates a task for each participant and notifies them with an e-mail message of a new document for review. When participants receive the notification and open the spreadsheet, they can complete their review and indicate their status on a workflow completion form.


Excel Services in ActionExcel Services gives the Finance department greater control over its important business information and simplifies the process of accessing external data. When Susan needs to connect to an external database to import data, she uses the Data Connection Library—without having to contact Fabrikam’s IT Help Desk for assistance. When Sylvie publishes spreadsheets to Office SharePoint Server 2007, she can specify which sections of the spreadsheet should be visible on the server. In one case, Sylvie decides to display an important bar chart that shows Fabrikam Inc.’s contribution margin. Before publishing this information company-wide, she sends it to Susan for approval. With the Office SharePoint Server 2007 workflow, Susan quickly receives an e-mail notification of the review task. When the information is published, Fabrikam Inc. gains insight into business performance so that they can respond more quickly to changing conditions.

Content Management OptionsCompanies are increasingly challenged with regulatory compliance. Many companies have migrated to electronic business processes and document management, but few companies have taken the steps to appropriately manage and audit electronic business records.

When a spreadsheet is complete and ready to be shared with an audience, you need to be confident that the document is not inadvertently shared with other parties. The spreadsheet should not include unintentional content or content that the recipient’s dictionary does not recognize. You may also want to indicate that this spreadsheet is the document of record, to indicate that this is the official company policy or procedure for a given topic.

Office Excel 2007 works with Excel Services, Office SharePoint Server 2007, and Microsoft Windows Rights Management Services to offer many more ways for users to help protect and manage their information.

Finishing Documents

The Finish menu (to activate, click the Office button) offers different options to gain more control over the document and reduce information risk.


Document Inspector: The document inspector inspects the document for hidden metadata or personal information (such as comments and annotations, document properties, custom XML data, hidden rows or columns, headers, or footers) When inspection is done, you will have the option to remove the information before distribution.

Add a Digital Signature: You can digitally sign a document for many of the same reasons you might sign a paper document. A digital signature is used to authenticate the spreadsheet—by using computer cryptography. Digital signatures help to establish that the signer is who he or she claims to be and that the content has not been changed or tampered with since it was digitally signed.

Mark as Final: Let readers know that the workbook is final and make it read-only.

Information Rights Management

You may need to protect and control who can access company information, especially if you are creating spreadsheets with highly confidential information. Using Windows Rights Management Services in Microsoft Windows Server™ 2003 with the Microsoft Office system, you can assign permissions that prevent others from copying, printing, or editing your spreadsheet. Permissions-based data access can also be applied to only parts of a spreadsheet.

Records Management

Office SharePoint Server 2007 provides a managed document repository built on Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services to store the document record or the master document in a Records Repository. Using Office Excel 2007, you can upload documents to this repository directly from the application. As a result, you have greater control and management over your spreadsheets.

Information Management Policies

With Office SharePoint Server 2007, information management policies provide controls that consistently enforce the labeling, auditing, and expiration of spreadsheets. You can configure policies for a specific storage location or content type. For example, organizations can work to ensure that all spreadsheets are stored the same way by setting the expiration dates on common criteria, such as the end of the fiscal year.


Office SharePoint Server 2007 supports a set of information management policies that can be defined for an entire site or a specific list, library, or content type. You can also create a policy statement informing others how the content is governed. For Office Excel 2007 spreadsheets, this policy statement is embedded in the spreadsheet. For instance, the policy statement might indicate that a document will expire after a certain period of time or that it is sensitive information that should not be communicated outside the company. It can even provide a contact name if the recipient needs more information.

Enabling Content Policies

It can be challenging to implement consistent information management policies across a broad organization with a wide range of sites. To solve this issue, Office SharePoint Server 2007 enables policy decision-makers—such as IT staff, records managers, or compliance officers—to define site policies that users can apply without worrying about the specific details. Each site policy can include any number of settings, like labeling expiration or auditing. As a result, you can add an extra layer of security to your spreadsheets by designating access to them. For example, if you only want to allow a certain department access to spreadsheets, you can easily define the spreadsheets to require the correct credentials.


SummaryMicrosoft Office Excel 2007 delivers the Office Fluent interface that presents the relevant tools you need when you need them. New formatting tools, new charts, expanded row counts, and Page Layout View will enable you to create better and bigger spreadsheets faster. Interactive PivotTable views and new conditional formatting options will help you organize, analyze, and spot trends in your data to make better-informed business decisions. Use Excel Services and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 to share business information with others and select which items to share through a Web browser. Manage important business information centrally and help ensure everyone is working with the most current data.


ResourcesFor more information about Office Excel 2007, please visit:

Office Excel 2007

http://www.microsoft.com/office/excel



System RequirementsFor complete system requirements, visit http://www.microsoft.com/office/excel.

This document is developed prior to the product's release to manufacturing, and as such, we cannot guarantee that all details included herein will be exactly as what is found in the shipping product. The information contained in this document represents the current view of Microsoft Corporation on the issues discussed as of the date of publication. Because Microsoft must respond to changing market conditions, this document should not be interpreted to be a commitment on the part of Microsoft, and Microsoft cannot guarantee the accuracy of any information presented after the date of publication. The information represents the product at the time this document was printed and should be used for planning purposes only. Information is subject to change at any time without prior notice. This document is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS DOCUMENT.

© 2006 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Microsoft, Excel, Fluent, the Office logo, PivotChart, PivotTable, PowerPoint, SharePoint, Windows, and Windows Server are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.



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