I’m pretty sure that the first thing you had in mind was to simply write “Y” or “N” to the cell to indicate that the answer is yes or no, respectively. But what if someone typed “y” or “n” instead of “Y” or “N”? What will also happen next once you begin processing the “Y”s and the “N”s in the spreadsheets?
It turns out that adding drop-down lists would be much easier for everyone using the spreadsheets. Primarily, this will ensure error-free data collection. Another one is that it would make it easier to fill up if you are using your smartphones. You could simply click the option instead of typing whole words via the keyboard:
Now let us learn how to add yes/no drop-down lists, using a spreadsheet containing records of payment for membership dues as an example.
Step 1: Select the range of cells where you want to add the yes/no drop-down list.
Step 2: Click on the Data option in the menu.
Step 3: A drop-down list will appear. Click on the “Data validation”.
A window for Data Validation will then appear:
Step 4: On the right of the Criteria label is a drop-down box where we can select where to get the list of items for the drop-down box. Select “List of items”.
Step 5: After selecting “List of items”, you can now type the items on the text box on the right side. Enter the items separated by comma, but do not leave space after the comma. Type “Yes,No”.
Step 6: Click save. The range of cells selected will now contain drop-down lists. You can now begin filling them up one-by-one.
If you no longer need the drop-down list from a certain cell (or a group of cells), then you can do the following:
Step 1: Select the cell or the range of cells with the drop-down list.
Step 2: Click on the Data option in the menu, and then click on the “Data validation” from the drop-down list.
Step 3: Click on Remove validation.
If you need to add more details than a Yes/No could give, then you could simply follow the same steps as above, adding other options as needed. One example would be:
The third option, “Not Registered” would indicate that the member is not yet registered on that year. We now have the following output:
Now that you have seen how to do it, it might be a little longer to implement, but nonetheless you would agree that a little extra time you took in adding them will make the data collection faster and smoother!
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