Printing, page setup and shortcuts

Aysel's report looks great on screen. When she prints it, though, the last column lands on a second page, page three has no headers and the gridlines are gone. Sound familiar? A few page settings fix all of this. In the second half of the lesson you will meet the shortcuts that set experts apart from beginners.

Print preview

1. 1
   Open the print screen

   Choose File › Print or press Ctrl+P. The right side shows how the pages will look, and you can page through them at the bottom.

2. 2
   Choose what to print

   Under Settings: Print Active Sheets, Print Entire Workbook or Print Selection (just the selected range).

3. 3
   Orientation and paper

   For a wide table choose Landscape Orientation, and usually A4 for the paper size. Narrow in the Margins list makes the margins smaller.

4. 4
   Fit it on the page

   In the scaling list at the bottom choose Fit All Columns on One Page — all the columns fit across one page. Fit Sheet on One Page shrinks the whole sheet onto one page (in a big table the text may get tiny).

The `Page Layout` tab

• Page Layout › Page Setup › Print Area › Set Print Area — only the selected range will be printed.
• Page Layout › Page Setup › Print Titles — type $1:$1 in Rows to repeat at top, and the header row repeats on every page.
• Page Layout › Scale to Fit — setting Width: 1 page fits the columns across one page.
• Page Layout › Sheet Options — Gridlines › Print prints the cell gridlines (by default they are not printed).

In View › Workbook Views › Page Break Preview, page borders are shown as blue lines — drag them with the mouse to decide where each page ends. To add page numbers, choose Insert › Text › Header & Footer and on the Header & Footer tab pick the ready-made “Page 1 of ?” option from the Header list — the printout will say something like “Page 1 of 3”. You can also build such a line yourself with the Page Number and Number of Pages buttons.

Essential shortcuts

Time-saving habits

• Key Tips: press and release Alt and letters appear on the ribbon. For example, Alt, H, O, I in sequence auto-fits the column width. You can reach any command without the mouse.
• Turn formulas into values: copy the cells, then Ctrl+Alt+V › Values › OK. The calculated results stay and the formulas disappear — handy before sending a file to someone.
• The Search box (Alt+Q): forgot where a command is? Type its name, e.g. “freeze”.
• Quick Access Toolbar: right-click a command you use often › Add to Quick Access Toolbar.
• Check quickly: select numbers and glance at the status bar; extend a formula to the end of the column by double-clicking the fill handle.