[comp.sys.mac.apps] MS Excel question: LOOKUP

6600star@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu (Lightning Man) (05/14/91)

I've got a question about the LOOKUP function in Excel 3.0. Is there
a way to get Excel to look at a single cell defining a _range_ of
integers? For instance:
This is the number I want to look up on the table: 6
Here's the table:
1-2	this
3-4	that
5-8	Spam
9-10	Macintosh

Is there a quick and dirty way to do this without using an ugly,
convoluted "IF" statement with lots of < and > characters?

This is a problem because I need to make some BIG tables, and having
each integer as its own entry would be REALLY time-consuming, as well
as making a BIG file...

Thanx in advance!

Matt Staroscik
6600star@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu

guelzow@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Andreas J. Guelzow) (05/14/91)

In article <11214@hub.ucsb.edu> 6600star@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu (Lightning Man) writes:
>I've got a question about the LOOKUP function in Excel 3.0. Is there
>a way to get Excel to look at a single cell defining a _range_ of
>integers? For instance:
>This is the number I want to look up on the table: 6
>Here's the table:
>1-2	this
>3-4	that
>5-8	Spam
>9-10	Macintosh
>
>Is there a quick and dirty way to do this without using an ugly,
>convoluted "IF" statement with lots of < and > characters?
>
I don't have Excel 3.0 yet but in the earlier versions you could
simply use the LOOKUP function and change your table to:
1	this
3	that
5	Spam
9	Macintosh

Andreas



-- 
Andreas J. Guelzow                       <guelzow@ccu.umanitoba.ca>

macq@miguel.llnl.gov (Don MacQueen) (05/15/91)

In article <11214@hub.ucsb.edu>, 6600star@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu (Lightning Man) writes:
|> I've got a question about the LOOKUP function in Excel 3.0. Is there
|> a way to get Excel to look at a single cell defining a _range_ of
|> integers? For instance:
|> This is the number I want to look up on the table: 6
|> Here's the table:
|> 1-2	this
|> 3-4	that
|> 5-8	Spam
|> 9-10	Macintosh
|> 
|> Is there a quick and dirty way to do this without using an ugly,
|> convoluted "IF" statement with lots of < and > characters?
|> 
|> This is a problem because I need to make some BIG tables, and having
|> each integer as its own entry would be REALLY time-consuming, as well
|> as making a BIG file...
|> 
|> Thanx in advance!
|> 
|> Matt Staroscik
|> 6600star@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu

I don't use excel, so I can't be sure, but I thought that the lookup function found the row with the next largest number. If so, then this should work:

2  this
4  that
8  Spam
10 Macintosh
-- 
--------------------
Don MacQueen
macq@miguel.llnl.gov
--------------------