InfoQube IM - Community

Submitted by markfoley on 2009/06/15 23:14

In Excel, if you select some cells, type a value and hit ctrl-enter, all cells are set to that value.

This would be very valueable in IQ also, if for example you want to set the category of 10 lines to be "current" or set the same due date for many items.

Logic would be:

If multiple cells are selected and all have the same data type, ctrl-enter commits the entered value from the active cell into all selected cells.

This can kind of be done via the properties window but isn't something you'd want to do too often if building project plans, changing duration of things etc.

Comments

and what would "enter" do with the entered value when several cells are selected (etc.) ? Couldn't the same effect be achieved with "enter" only ?

Try it in Excel. The idea (which I like) is to simulate Excel. Thanks for the suggestion and for pointing me this feature of Excel, which I didn't know of (I do a copy/paste to achieve the same)

Yes, the copy/paste will do the same.

I was wondering though if, when multiple fields (Yes/No, etc.) are selected, changing one value could change the field value of all item selected (like when using the properties pane (and show the same warning about multiple items being changed etc.). Just an idea (since I don't really see the use of only modifying one item's field when multiple items are selected.)

Yep it's a great feature I only learnt about after some years, but I use it all the time. There are probably some other great shortcuts we could steal from Excel later, also, like:

Shift-space: select whole row

Ctrl-space: select whole column

Shift-Ctrl-Space: Select 'region' (populated area bounded by blank cells). This one would be less suitable.

Tap end then a cursor key - jump to end of region in the direction you indicate, eg far right/left or start/end of list.

Bounding box enhancements - click an edge of your 'selected cell' box to do the same as the end-cursorkey combo.

Given how universal Excel is, if a function is the same in IQ we should remain in line with it I believe, and users will feel more at home in the IQ environment...