Running Totals

[jhopkins]

I hope this is simple ! Col. B, list of items. Col. A is where I place a number 1 against the items I have checked. I need a running total of the 1's to appear at the top of the column. I tried =SUM(A:A) but it doesn't work. Have I missed something obvious?

[arthurbr]

Which result do you get? Maybe post a sample sheet to let us see what it might be

[Richard Buttrey]

Hi,

Have you also put the =SUM(A:A) in column A? In which case you have entered a circular reference and will be getting odd results. Put the formula somewhere else, or change it to =SUM(A10:A1000) and enter it above row 10 in column A.

HTH

[jhopkins]

I have put the =SUM(A:A) at the top of Col A and have entered nothing at Col B. When I enter 1's in Col A , I just get 1's....no total

[arthurbr]

Well, as Richard said you created a circular reference.
Have you tried his solution, on entering the formula in ,say, colC ?

[jhopkins]

I don't understand. I can't use column C as it has other things in. How do I show you the page on here?

[Richard Buttrey]

You only need one cell somewhere to hold the formula. Any cell will do as long as it's not in Column A.

Alternatively don't use A:A in the formula but say A10:A1000 as I suggested, with the formula somewhere in A1:A9

Rgds

[jhopkins]

I am clearly mising the point here. There are about 11000 items, so I have tried entering =SUM(A10:A11500) at the top of COL C, and in cell A9 in Col A...neither of those options gives me a running total that I can find...just a nice column full of 1's.

[jhopkins]

OK..I'm up and running. What I didn't understand was that the formula has to be entered directly into the cell....it seemed obvious ( to me at any rate ) that what I was supposed to do was highlight a cell or column and then enter the formula after the = sign at the top of the sheet...wrong !! I guess that = sign is just there for ornament..... Anyway, many thanks...I'm just glad that spread-sheets are only a minute part of my life.....

[shg]

It's the ornament that tells Excel you're entering a formula.

[jhopkins]

Very pretty !