Search and Replace
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Search and Replace

Abstract

Use the search command for specific content in a worksheet

In practical situations spreadsheets are often quite large and we need quick methods of locating items.

Suppose you have a spreadsheet loaded as shown on the next screen and you wish to locate an item.

  1. Edit->Find and replace

  2. Type the item in the Search for window.

  3. Click Find all to highlight all occurrences of the item.

    The effect of using Find all is shown on the previous screen.

OR

  1. Click Find.

    This will select the first occurrence of the item.

  2. Click Find repeatedly to locate further occurrences.

Use the replace command for specific content in a worksheet

The Find command simply locates occurrences of an item. It does not change these in any way. You may do so manually, if you wish.

The Replace command on the other hand is useful when we wish to change entries.

The Replace command provides us with two methods of replacement.

Replace all replaces all occurrences of the item with the new entry without further prompting.

Replace gives you the option of changing each occurrence or not.

  1. Edit->Find and replace

  2. Type appropriate entries in the Search for window and the Replace with window.

Global replacement

  • Click Replace all.

In this case all occurrences of Andiswa will be replaced by Andisa without any further prompting.

Selective replacement

  1. Click Find to locate the first occurrence.

  2. Click Replace if you wish to replace this item or Click Find to locate the next occurrence.

  3. Repeat this process until you have cycled through all the occurrences.

Important Find and replace options

The check boxes allow you to refine the Find and replace procedures.

Backwards

By default, the Find procedure moves to the right and down the spreadsheet, ie forwards. If you wish to move backwards, check this option.

Match case

By default, the Find procedure ignores the case of text. This is called case insensitive. Where you wish to match the case of text, check this box. The Search is then said to be case sensitive.

Entire cells

By default, the Find procedure looks anywhere in the cell for the search data. The following screen shows the effect of using the default.

If, however, the Entire cells box had been checked, the result of this search would have been the following message:

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