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Scheherazade
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08 Mar 2007, 8:49 pm

Is there some way to random sort columns in Excel? Or would I have to do that with another program? I'm not high-tech, so the simpler the better.

I have a spreadsheet with about 5 columns, and I'd like to be able to select one cell from each column at random. I can do that manually, I guess, but I'd much rather have some way to get the computer to mix them up for me. Any tips?



lau
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09 Mar 2007, 9:08 am

I've uploaded an example of what I think you're after. The twin bits you want are "INDEX" to use calculated values to address bits of a spreadsheet and "RAND" for the random numbers.
I whipped up a 9Kb open document spreadsheet randcol.ods using OpenOffice, where I actually used "RANDBETWEEN", which is more convenient.
I then wasn't sure that Excel has that function, so I reverted to just using "RAND" for the xls file. The xls file was ten times the size, so I zipped it as randcol.zip.
HTH



Scheherazade
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13 Mar 2007, 9:54 pm

Thanks for your help! I'll have to sit down and figure that out, but it sounds about right.