Comments on: Converting Names to Local

By: Mpemba

Mpemba — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 10:08:00 +0000

Create Names Local would be a very useful addition to Excel itself
Even just a little tick-box
Even better an option to make local names the default.

By: jkpieterse

jkpieterse — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 08:03:00 +0000

Hi Kanwaljit,

No, not yet. As many self employed Excel devs I know, I'm swamped with work nowadays.
Good point though!

By: Kanwaljit

Kanwaljit — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 05:27:00 +0000

Hi Jan,
That comments area of Name Manager in Excel 2007 is quite handy. Any plans to add that in Name Manager ?
Kanwaljit

By: jkpieterse

jkpieterse — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 19:23:00 +0000

Well, I didn't add create names, because that is one of the few things the Excel names UI does quite well.

I'd like to point you all at the "List" and "Pick up" functions though, those two are quite powerful.

I sometimes use them to build complex refersto formulas using string functions:

- in the first column you write the names
- in the second you build the refersto formulas (as strings), using any and all string parsing formulas excel has to offer (and Search and replace and whatever other text parsing you need).
- then you fire up NM and click the pickup button to create those names.

Dick: if you have a hard time remembering the icons, try the non-icon buttons (look at the bottom of the settings listbox, there are more than just three options to set there!!!).

By: Jan

Jan — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 23:20:00 +0000

I always use Ctrl Shift F3 for almost everything and I always try to leave the names where possible on sheet in italics CamelCaseAndNoSpaces. I always used OAK to manage Names. Mainly because it was originally co-written by my old boss Doc Sarmecanic.

By: Dick Kusleika

Dick Kusleika — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 22:34:00 +0000

Charles: The only additional thing I want is to be able to make them locally scoped.

By: Doug Glancy

Doug Glancy — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 19:54:00 +0000

I guess I've never used Excel's Create Name either (hence my onion-like layers of ignorance in this post). Maybe now I understand Dick's original request.

I'd like to be able to name ranges based on cell contents using patterns, e.g., if the selected cells contain "First Name", etc. I could choose a pattern of:
"rng" & replace(cell.text," ","")
so the names would be "rngFirstName", etc.

I was thinking about dynamic named ranges, but I don't usually use that many per project, and they are often finicky, e.g., "don't count the contents in the hidden template rows above the start of the dynamic range," and they are often based on the contents of helper columns, so it seems like the automation would have to be very complex to create just a few ranges.

By: Charles Williams

Charles Williams — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 18:30:00 +0000

Dick has a good point though: we don't currently have a 'Create Names' command in Name Manager, only a 'Define Name' command.
This is probably because neither me or Jan Karel ever uses 'Create Name'!

If we were to add Create Name, what additional function beyond the current Excel stuff would people like?

By: Doug Glancy

Doug Glancy — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 17:04:00 +0000

Dick, My reading comprehension is not what I would wish, or I would have just told you. I read your whole post thinking "Name Manager works like that" then got to the end and thought you were asking for a different feature which I've I also wanted, which, it turns out is right there anyways.

If it weren't for this fine blog, I'd still be in the dark, so thanks once again for this great place to learn.

By: Dick Kusleika

Dick Kusleika — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 15:01:00 +0000

I didn’t realize that I could convert names to local – I thought the globe with the X on it meant the tool was unavailable. (When I hover over tools, the tooltips appear on my primary monitor, so I don’t see them.) Converting those via NM would have been faster than writing that code.