Displaying the relationships between cells

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Displaying the relationships between cells

FreeOffice: Formula auditing is not included in SoftMaker FreeOffice.

The command group Formula | Traces provides, amongst others, commands that can be used to display the relationships between cells graphically.

traces_sample

To do this, select the cell you want to analyze and then choose one of the following commands from the command group Formula | Traces:

traces_group

Note: The commands Trace to error, Previous error, Next error are described later, see Detecting errors in calculations.

traces_pre_icon Trace predecessors

This command displays an arrow to each cell that the calculation in the current cell refers to.
Example: If the current cell contains the formula =A1*A2, this command will display arrows pointing to the cells A1 and A2.

traces_pre_icon Trace predecessors dropdown_arrow | Select predecessors

This command selects all cells that the calculation in the current cell refers to.
Example: If the current cell contains the formula =A1*A2, this command will select the cells A1 and A2.

traces_remove_all_icon Remove all traces dropdown_arrow | Remove traces to predecessors

Hides all arrows that were added with the command Trace predecessors for the current cell.

traces_succ_icon Trace successors

Displays an arrow to each cell that refers to the current cell.
Example: If a cell contains the formula =B5*2, this command will display an arrow pointing to this cell when you choose the command in cell B5.

traces_succ_icon Trace successors dropdown_arrow | Select successors

Selects all cells that refer to the current cell.
Example: If any cell contains e.g. the formula =B5*2, this cell will be selected when you choose the command in cell B5.

traces_remove_all_icon Remove all traces dropdown_arrow | Remove traces to successors

Hides all arrows that were added with the command Trace successors for the current cell.

traces_remove_all_icon Remove all traces

Removes all arrows added with the commands Trace predecessors or Trace successors for the entire workbook.
Click directly on the icon itself or use the icon's arrow and choose Remove all tracesin the dropdown menu.

Notes and tips

If desired, you can choose the commands Trace predecessors and Trace successors multiple times in a cell. Another level of relationships will be displayed every time you do that.

The tracer arrows displayed by the above commands are clickable. When you click such an arrow, PlanMaker jumps to the cell at the other end of the arrow.

If the current cell is referring to a cell located on a different worksheet, just a small arrow will be displayed in the top left corner of the cell. Again, you can click this arrow to jump to the related cell.

All tracer arrows pointing to a cell will be removed when you edit, move or delete the cell.

Tracer arrows also appear in the printout.

However, the arrows are not stored in the document. Thus, when you save a document, close it and open it again, all arrows are removed.