Generating Excel
Introduction to generating Excel with Models
Overview
You can generate an Excel spreadsheet from your Model at the click of a button.
These spreadsheets are:
Free of copy/paste formula errors
Neatly and consistently formatted
Fully-working and dynamic, allowing your colleagues and clients to explore your model without needing access to the Models software
Layouts
To generate Excel, you first need to create a Layout. The Layout tells Models where you want the various parts of your Model (Variables, Assumptions, Dashboards etc.) to appear in your spreadsheet.
Your Model's Layout is independent of the Calculation structure - so unlike in Excel, moving things around in the Layout can't affect any of the Calculations being performed. This means you can quickly edit the layout of your spreadsheet, without needing to worry about breaking a formula. Instead, you can focus on improving the readability of the spreadsheet, or whatever is important for your particular project.
That said, you do need to make sure that you have included all components of a Calculation in the Layout for the Calculation to be performed. If your Layout is missing a part of a Calculation tree (any Variables and Assumptions on which the Calculation is dependent), the spreadsheet will still be generated, but you will see warnings where components are missing.
Currently, you can only create one Layout per Model. We may add the ability to create multiple Layouts in future updates (e.g. so that you can include/exclude parts of the Model depending on audience) - let us know if you would be interested in this feature.
Layout Views
Models provides two views for examining your Excel layout, Spreadsheet view (left) and Logical view (right).
Spreadsheet view (default)
This view shows a representation of how your generated Excel will look, including all calculated values, and borders, bold/italic text (note, it does not show how the selected Model Theme will look).
Values representing assumptions (with a green background) can be edited directly in this view.
Logical view
This view shows simplified Line Groups and Variables but does not show any calculated values. This view is helpful when reorganising a sheet and allows quick rearranging of items.
Creating your Layout Automatically
Models provides an easy way of adding multiple items to the Layout in a logical fashion with just a few button clicks. Details are on the next page.
Creating your Layout Manually
Models provides two main methods of creating and editing your Layout manually:
From within the Sheets tab of the Model Editor. Here you can easily see all of the items in each Sheet and edit them directly.
By adding items directly to the Layout from the Variables, Assumptions and Metrics tabs. Here you can add items to the Layout as you create them without needing to leave your workflow.
The next sections provide more detail of how to build and edit your Layout.
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