Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Switching from Excel to Numbers - who's done it?
- Thread starter josh2007
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Are you referring to building your own from SUMIF(S) or is there really a Pivot Table tool in Numbers? If so, what is it called?
For fun (because I'm lame) I'm experimenting with moving my personal finance workbook to numbers. It used 6-layer sumifs and pivot tables with slicers. The nested if statements worked well, though as @maflynn mentioned, I find the formula editor very cumbersome to work with compared to excel.
I'm going to try and build my own Pivot Tables, but if there is a built in option then I'd love to hear it.
@MyopicPaideia Can you answer the above?
Last edited:
Very late to the discussion... Not exactly a spreadsheet power user, but far from a novice (my father and grandfather were both accountants, and I cut my teeth on ledger books, 13-column paper spreadsheets, fountain pens, and hand-cranked adding machines - just about everything but green eyeshades). I haven't used Office for Windows in something like 10 years. I remember using the MS Works spreadsheet (and disliking it madly), dabbled with Quattro Pro back in the day, but I didn't become proficient until Excel. I had no particular complaints or problems with Excel, but when I moved to Mac on a full-time basis (was dual-platform for about 10 years before that, and all-PC prior to that), I decided to give Numbers a try. As with Pages, I've felt no urge to go back to MS.
Maybe it's my lack of sophistication with Excel (no, I don't do pivot tables), but I didn't run into many conversion errors for my existing sheets, and some of them were whoppers. Once converted, I was happy to never go back - just way too much clutter in Office apps, far too many unused functions. I've been able to do everything I've wanted to do with Numbers, with very little fuss.
To me, the trick/trap with Numbers (and Pages) tends to be the hidden stuff - there's a lot that lurks beneath that clean surface. There have also been times when I've needed to use OpenOffice as an intermediate step - one business I deal with exports its internal database reports to an ancient .xls format that Numbers won't parse. But since I really don't like working with OpenOffice, once the file's been saved as .xlsx, I'm off to Numbers.
Fortunately, I don't have to exchange spreadsheets with Excel users all that much - if I did, I'd probably have paid the "Microsoft tax." As it is, I consider that double-taxation.
Maybe it's my lack of sophistication with Excel (no, I don't do pivot tables), but I didn't run into many conversion errors for my existing sheets, and some of them were whoppers. Once converted, I was happy to never go back - just way too much clutter in Office apps, far too many unused functions. I've been able to do everything I've wanted to do with Numbers, with very little fuss.
To me, the trick/trap with Numbers (and Pages) tends to be the hidden stuff - there's a lot that lurks beneath that clean surface. There have also been times when I've needed to use OpenOffice as an intermediate step - one business I deal with exports its internal database reports to an ancient .xls format that Numbers won't parse. But since I really don't like working with OpenOffice, once the file's been saved as .xlsx, I'm off to Numbers.
Fortunately, I don't have to exchange spreadsheets with Excel users all that much - if I did, I'd probably have paid the "Microsoft tax." As it is, I consider that double-taxation.
Similar case here. I used MS Office for decades at work and purchased it for work at home so I could work at home on occasion and also for personal use as I was familiar with it. After I retired I ended up doing some presentations and wasn't looking forward to using PowerPoint. For some reason Powerpoint seemed to be the weakest application of the MS Office suite for me. So I decided to give Keynote a go and really like it. Then for new spreadsheets I fired up Numbers and like it. I don't make sophisticated spreadsheets so I haven't reached any limitations but it has everything i need and is quite user friendly. The same is true with Pages. Without intending to, I moved from MS Office to Apple's products and will not upgrade my MS Office programs and I'm quite happy with that.Very late to the discussion... Not exactly a spreadsheet power user, but far from a novice (my father and grandfather were both accountants, and I cut my teeth on ledger books, 13-column paper spreadsheets, fountain pens, and hand-cranked adding machines - just about everything but green eyeshades). I haven't used Office for Windows in something like 10 years. I remember using the MS Works spreadsheet (and disliking it madly), dabbled with Quattro Pro back in the day, but I didn't become proficient until Excel. I had no particular complaints or problems with Excel, but when I moved to Mac on a full-time basis (was dual-platform for about 10 years before that, and all-PC prior to that), I decided to give Numbers a try. As with Pages, I've felt no urge to go back to MS.
Maybe it's my lack of sophistication with Excel (no, I don't do pivot tables), but I didn't run into many conversion errors for my existing sheets, and some of them were whoppers. Once converted, I was happy to never go back - just way too much clutter in Office apps, far too many unused functions. I've been able to do everything I've wanted to do with Numbers, with very little fuss.
To me, the trick/trap with Numbers (and Pages) tends to be the hidden stuff - there's a lot that lurks beneath that clean surface. There have also been times when I've needed to use OpenOffice as an intermediate step - one business I deal with exports its internal database reports to an ancient .xls format that Numbers won't parse. But since I really don't like working with OpenOffice, once the file's been saved as .xlsx, I'm off to Numbers.
Fortunately, I don't have to exchange spreadsheets with Excel users all that much - if I did, I'd probably have paid the "Microsoft tax." As it is, I consider that double-taxation.
I have been using Excel for years at work and at home. I am now retired but have continued my Excel spreadsheets at home for tracking finances, a checking account register and a lot of other meaningless stuff. Finding out tonight that my old Office for Mac 2011 will not work with the new High Sierra OS I have decided to move all my Excel spreadsheets to numbers. I have practiced with a couple of non-important ones.
I have a couple of questions ...
1. I have one large spreadsheet with a new tab for each year. BUT I link prior year data into my current spreadsheet. Can I do that same function in Numbers?
2. Another sheet I have converted to numbers has basic charts. AFter they were imported into numbers, all the data is fine but the charts are messed up in design. I am assuming I will need to add new charts to replace the ones I tried to import. Is there a way to hold the curser down and move that new chart(s) to a different area of the spreadsheet?
By default Numbers puts the charts at the bottom where I tried to insert the new chart to the right of the data.
I have the latest version of Numbers on an iMac built (late 2015).
Thanks for your help and I am sure the answer is staring right at me when I am in numbers. Ha.
I have a couple of questions ...
1. I have one large spreadsheet with a new tab for each year. BUT I link prior year data into my current spreadsheet. Can I do that same function in Numbers?
2. Another sheet I have converted to numbers has basic charts. AFter they were imported into numbers, all the data is fine but the charts are messed up in design. I am assuming I will need to add new charts to replace the ones I tried to import. Is there a way to hold the curser down and move that new chart(s) to a different area of the spreadsheet?
By default Numbers puts the charts at the bottom where I tried to insert the new chart to the right of the data.
I have the latest version of Numbers on an iMac built (late 2015).
Thanks for your help and I am sure the answer is staring right at me when I am in numbers. Ha.
I tried to switch to Numbers earlier this year after it was made into a free release (it was never installed on my 2012 machine, or if it was I deleted it and would have had to repurchase it). I worked in finance for several years after college and was relatively proficient in Excel and have continued to use it for the odd spreadsheet I need. My husband is a PC guy and a CFO of a bank, so he is an excel whiz.
One thing I track is my kids' swim times. I have been tracking them for many years and when I decided to switch to Numbers, I converted the (2008 for Mac version) Excel spreadsheet to Numbers. I spent several hours trying to get Numbers to format their times as Minute:Seconds.milliseconds. It was ridiculous. I was able to get it formatted properly in ONE CELL in the entire spreadsheet, and no matter how many times I copied the format, the actual number or anything else, the times in every other cell defaulted to some other format.
My biggest hangup with the Office products is that my version is nearly 10 years old and it is a slog on my computer. I don't use them often but when I do use them, I want to use them easily. I recently upgraded to the 2017 iMac and they seem to work better here than on my older machine. I will stick to the Office products and when they are no longer useable on whatever OS I have, I will just buy the new version of Office. I have used the Microsoft products for over 20 years, and just have a hard time thinking like Apple for the productivity software, even though I love them for everything else.
One thing I track is my kids' swim times. I have been tracking them for many years and when I decided to switch to Numbers, I converted the (2008 for Mac version) Excel spreadsheet to Numbers. I spent several hours trying to get Numbers to format their times as Minute:Seconds.milliseconds. It was ridiculous. I was able to get it formatted properly in ONE CELL in the entire spreadsheet, and no matter how many times I copied the format, the actual number or anything else, the times in every other cell defaulted to some other format.
My biggest hangup with the Office products is that my version is nearly 10 years old and it is a slog on my computer. I don't use them often but when I do use them, I want to use them easily. I recently upgraded to the 2017 iMac and they seem to work better here than on my older machine. I will stick to the Office products and when they are no longer useable on whatever OS I have, I will just buy the new version of Office. I have used the Microsoft products for over 20 years, and just have a hard time thinking like Apple for the productivity software, even though I love them for everything else.
I think there is less reason now to convert to Numbers/Page/Keystone as MS Office 2016 for Mac is so much better (and more like the windows version) than any before. I used to work with Office 2008 for Mac as I wanted Office on my home Mac and I am used to if from work. The 2008 version was dreadful! I did not even bother to change to 2011.
The only thing I am still struggling with is Outlook vs iCal. I use iCal as it integrates well across devices (including AW). The only thing that bothers me that any interaction with PC Outlook users or Enterprise emails creates issues with calendar entries: you never know if invites arrived or got accepted when exchanging information between Mac and outlook.
The only thing I am still struggling with is Outlook vs iCal. I use iCal as it integrates well across devices (including AW). The only thing that bothers me that any interaction with PC Outlook users or Enterprise emails creates issues with calendar entries: you never know if invites arrived or got accepted when exchanging information between Mac and outlook.
It was my understanding that the new OS High Sierra would not work with MS Office for Mac. Thus my reason for converting to Numbers now ahead of time. I do very basic spreadsheets, no pivot tables. All I want to do is link a cell value from Numbers spreadsheet tab to another tab within the same Spreadsheet .... Like I do in Excel now with one tab to another. (ie: 2016 value to my 2017 spreadsheet)
That would be shocking - and I doubt that it is true. Office 2016 for Mac was just updated with TB support. There seems to be no reason to do so, if it would "expire" with OS High Sierra (which is not a major change to OS Sierra). We will know soon.
[doublepost=1503429487][/doublepost]Just found this:
Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote will install and run on 10.13. Not all Office functionality may be available, and you may encounter stability problems where apps unexpectedly quit. During the beta period for macOS 10.13 High Sierra, no formal support is available for this Office configuration.
Microsoft Office support for macOS 10.13 High Sierra -
I agree, I found that hard to believe. If it was to be temporary it would eventually be worked out.
I HAVE FOUND MY ANSWER !!!!
My questions have been asked by others when I searched this forum before posting ... so maybe this will help them. I converted all of my Excel spreadsheets to Numbers this afternoon. I found out to my relieve that the majority of them did NOT have any linked cells. It was just my main personal finance spreadsheet I keep where I link monthly averages of the prior year.
When I converted that file, I highlighted the cell of one of those 2016 monthly averages and found this formula:
2016::Table 1:S4
That was all I needed and couldn't find that anywhere in my internet search, nor the Numbers Manual. It is a little different as with any change but I can get used to using Numbers on what few "basic" spreadsheets I use. Since I have Office for Mac 2011 I was going to have to upgrade to 2016 anyway but I'll save some bucks and use Numbers.
Thanks for your help, replies and feedback in this thread.