Blank Cells in Pivot Table Source Data

[TINHAMMER]

I am a new user of Pivot Tables, and I am reading several different sources to better learn how to use this Microsoft Excel tool.

Most sources I have read say to fill in as many blank cells in your data source as possible. The one source I am reading said although filling in cells is not required to create a workable pivot table, blank cells are generally errors waiting to happen. This source says a good practice is to represent missing values with some logical missing value code wherever possible. (Microsoft Excel Pivot Table Data Crunching is the source I am quoting).

I am not sure what a logical missing value code is?

In real life how many data sources are 100 percent free of blank cells and what are some of the tricks to handle these blank cells? Is there something I can read that addresses this specific issue.

Thanks for your help.

[NewYears1978]

I haven't had too many issues with blanks in Pivot Tables. They can of course cause issues with calculations sometimes or you will get (blanks) as a field in a Pivot Table. Generally speaking I can work around the blanks in the data.
But this depends on the data, if they are huge datasets and large pivot tables it can get messy.
If you're using PowerQuery for anything those blanks or improper data can cause a lot more problems.

The cleaner you can get source data, the better, of course.

I am not 100% on this but as for the Logical Missing Value, I think this just means a value you input, that you know it means there was no data. Such as "NA" or "-" or something like that.

[TINHAMMER]

Thanks for the response. I figured the NA was a possibility for a text field, it is all of the other value types that had me concerned - dates, currency, etc.

I may be taking the No Blanks as an absolute. I am not talking about huge datasets so I will just do things on a trial and error basis.

I do appreciate your response, I was starting to believe no one was going to respond. I would think this issue is a problem with new users to Microsoft Excel Tables and Microsoft Excel Pivot Tables.

Thanks Again.