Dave Bruns

The AREAS function returns the number of areas in a given reference as a number. In this context, areas mean separate contiguous ranges. AREAS takes just one argument, called reference. Reference can include more than one reference, but...Read more

The ADDRESS function returns the address for a cell based on a given row and column number. For example, =ADDRESS(1,1) returns $A$1. ADDRESS can return a relative, mixed, or absolute reference, and can be used to construct a cell reference inside a formula. Note that ADDRESS returns a...Read more

The VALUE function is meant to convert a text value that represents a number into a numeric value. The text can be a date, a time, or any other number, so long as the format can be recognized by Excel. When the conversion is successful, the result is a numeric value with no number formatting....Read more

The TRIM function strips extra spaces from text, leaving only a single space between words, and removing any leading or trailing space. For example:

=TRIM("   A stitch    in time.   ")  // returns "A stitch in time."

The TRIM function can...Read more

The TEXT function in Excel is a tool for formatting numbers, dates, and times as text. The purpose of the TEXT function is to convert a number to text using a specified format code. TEXT is most often used to control the formatting of a number embedded into a text string. However, TEXT is also a...Read more

The SUBSTITUTE function is a way to perform a find‑and‑replace with a formula. Use it when you know what text you want to change, but you don’t know (or care) where it appears in a text string. By default, SUBSTITUTE will replace all instances of a text string with another text...Read more

The SEARCH function returns the position (as a number) of one text string inside another. In the most basic case, you can use SEARCH to locate the position of a substring in a text string. You can also use SEARCH to check if a cell contains specific text....Read more

The REPT function repeats characters a specified number of times. Although REPT can repeat numbers as well as text, the result from REPT is always a text value. REPT takes two arguments, text and number_times. Text is the character(s...Read more