Start Using Resolver One

Before exploring Resolver One's features in depth, let's kick off with a simple example. We're going to create a price list for an imaginary office supplies company. Resolver One's features make the resulting workbook easy to extend and update.

This introduces you to three core Resolver One features:

• Defining a function and using it in the grid.
• Setting and using header rows.
• Writing simple sheet-wide conditional formatting.

You can see the end result by selecting Start, Resolver One, Samples, Simple functions and formatting. However, you'll probably learn more by building it from scratch. Here's how...

1. Open a fresh Resolver One Workbook.

2. Enter the list of products that the company stocks, and their net prices excluding tax:

   

   (You will need to adjust the width of column A to make everything visible.)

3. Apply Bold to the first row of your table by selecting it (click on the "1" row header), then clicking the "B" icon in the toolbar:

   

4. Turn the first row into a Header Row by right-clicking inside it and selecting Set Header Row:

   

5. Click in Coding Pane the Pre-constants section, and enter the following case-sensitive user code:

   

   This function calculates what the gross price would be once VAT (sales tax) has been added onto the net amount, where Gross Price = 1.175 * Net Price.

6. Add a new column header to the right of the "Net Price" one: "Gross Price":

   

7. In cell C2, to show the gross price of the paper, enter =withVAT(B2)

   

   The new function calculates the gross price of the goods in this column.

8. Copy cell C2, then select the range from C3 to C7, and hit paste:

   

   The formula is copied with appropriate adjustments for each row.

9. Format the numbers in both price columns so that they are listed to two decimal places. To do this, select the two columns in the grid by clicking on the "B" header, and then dragging to the "C" header, then from the "Format" menu select "Number", set the "Decimal places" option appropriately, and then click OK:

   

10. Add user code to highlight the rows that have a gross price of over 25.00. To do this, enter the following into the Post-formulae user code—the code is still case-sensitive!

    

    When you click back on the grid, the rows for Printer Ink, Table and Notepads will all be highlighted to show that their price is greater than 25.

    

11. Add another row to the bottom:

    

12. Copy the formula for the gross price down from the Notepads row so that you can see the appropriate Gross Price:

    

    As soon as there is a Gross price, the row is highlighted.

A later example (Columns generated by code) shows how you can use more advanced code to avoid even having to copy the gross price formula when adding more rows.

Back to Sample Spreadsheets.