ExcelZone Compendium: Working with accounts data (Excel 2007 update)

Excel Zone includes a substantial number of articles, and questions and answers on how to extract data from accounting systems and then use Excel to work with and present the information. Simon Hurst presents an overview of resources to help you with this activity. First of all the article looks at filtering database fields and the general principles of importing data into Excel, with specific examples referring to particular accounting software packages. It then considers some of the main techniques for manipulating the results including, of course, the ubiquitous Pivot Tables before a final excursion into presenting the data – including the use of charts and 'dashboard' techniques. Using Microsoft Query to create dynamic links to external data is a key technique to reduce your reporting workload through parameter queries or 'run-time filters', as David Carter refers to them. Using a parameter query allows one or more prompts to be displayed when the data based on a query is refreshed – the full article shows how, and includes some introductory tips as well as links to further tutorial articles.

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