Today, a question about the Excel Watch Window. If you make changes to the format of a watched cell, why won't the format in the Watch Window change? Episode 864 shows you how to set up the watch window and how to get the latest formatting changes.
Transcript of the video:
Welcome back to the MrExcel netcast, I'm Bill Jelen.
Well, today, a question about the Watch Window.
Now, if you haven't seen this, this is a great feature.
Let's say that you have a workbook with several different worksheets in your one summary sheet, and say you're working back on, you know, the seventeenth worksheet, and you need to see the impact of those changes on a few cells on the summary sheet.
We can go to Tools, Formula Auditing, and say Show Watch Window.
And what it is, it's a little window that floats above your screen here, and we can add a watch, and maybe say we want to keep our eye back on some cell on the summary table.
Click Add.
And then as we change numbers back here on this worksheet, we'll see the impact of those watch cells.
Other benefits: You can also double-click to quickly jump to the watch cell-- it's almost kind of like a bookmark.
Now, the question the person had was, well, hey, back here, let's say that we formatted this cell, made it Currency, made it look better-- less decimal places-- and now we want that to show up here in the Watch Window-- it never seems to appear.
Well it turns out that what you have to do is double-click that line in the Watch Window, and that will force Excel to go back and pull in the new format.
So as you make any formatting changes, just double click in the Watch Window and you can very quickly see that.
Now, the Watch Window...
Actually, I'm going to make it wider here-- I always size mine down because I don't care what the formula is and so I always make it a little bit smaller because I don't need to see what the formula is.
I also really don't care what the name is, so I usually make that smaller in order to make the whole Watch Window just as small as possible.
Now, the Watch Window is something that we've had in VBA for 10 years, but it was just added new in Excel 2003-- great little feature that's out there for keeping your eye on certain cells on different sheets in the workbook.
Well I want to thank you for stopping by, we'll see you next time for another netcast from MrExcel.
[ music ]
Well, today, a question about the Watch Window.
Now, if you haven't seen this, this is a great feature.
Let's say that you have a workbook with several different worksheets in your one summary sheet, and say you're working back on, you know, the seventeenth worksheet, and you need to see the impact of those changes on a few cells on the summary sheet.
We can go to Tools, Formula Auditing, and say Show Watch Window.
And what it is, it's a little window that floats above your screen here, and we can add a watch, and maybe say we want to keep our eye back on some cell on the summary table.
Click Add.
And then as we change numbers back here on this worksheet, we'll see the impact of those watch cells.
Other benefits: You can also double-click to quickly jump to the watch cell-- it's almost kind of like a bookmark.
Now, the question the person had was, well, hey, back here, let's say that we formatted this cell, made it Currency, made it look better-- less decimal places-- and now we want that to show up here in the Watch Window-- it never seems to appear.
Well it turns out that what you have to do is double-click that line in the Watch Window, and that will force Excel to go back and pull in the new format.
So as you make any formatting changes, just double click in the Watch Window and you can very quickly see that.
Now, the Watch Window...
Actually, I'm going to make it wider here-- I always size mine down because I don't care what the formula is and so I always make it a little bit smaller because I don't need to see what the formula is.
I also really don't care what the name is, so I usually make that smaller in order to make the whole Watch Window just as small as possible.
Now, the Watch Window is something that we've had in VBA for 10 years, but it was just added new in Excel 2003-- great little feature that's out there for keeping your eye on certain cells on different sheets in the workbook.
Well I want to thank you for stopping by, we'll see you next time for another netcast from MrExcel.
[ music ]
