Use absolute cell references in iWork table formulas

Oct 24, '06 07:30:05AM

Contributed by: Anonymous

While there is a lot of room for improvement and enhancement in the tables section of Pages, which I believe is coming soon, I did stumble upon this one which is, to my understanding, not documented. The feature is the absolute cell reference found in most spreadsheets by using the $ before the column and row address.

So if you want a fixed cell reference in your Pages (or Keynote) formula, just enter it as, for example, $B$7, or $B7 to just keep the column fixed. Read on for a longer explanation of fixed cell references and spreadsheets, if you'd like a bit more info on how they work.

[robg adds: I scanned the whole formula section of the user manual, and fixed cell references don't seem to be mentioned at all.]

The following is for those unfamiliar with spreadsheets in general. To make cell A1 an absolute reference in a series of equations, enter $A$1. For example, if you create the following equation in row 1 column C...

C1=A1-B1
If you fill this equation to cells below C1, you will get the following:
C2=A2-B2
C3=A3-B3
C4=A4-B4
etc.
When you make A1 an absolute cell reference in the equation...
C1=$A$1-B1
You will get the following when you fill in the cells below C1:
C2=$A$1-B2
C3=$A$1-B3
C4=$A$1-B4
etc.
It will always keep A1 as the cell to refer to in the equation. Quite handy in certain situations.

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