How to compare columns to seek for new and/or removed items

[Miguel Pereira]

Hello all!
I know this is my first post here, but it seems a great community, and I've been seeking for long and I haven't been able to find the answer to this by myself.

I'm sort of a newbie in Excel, I've been using it for years, but I never used complex stuff, only the direct and simple ones.

At the moment I do need a tool to compare codes. The thing is, I have a database with thousands of codes, which may or may not repeat themselfs. This database is refreshed daily and I need to know what's new and what's out of it.

The other info in the database I don't really need, I just need to check if there are new codes or old ones are out. The answer could be in red and green, or something like that.

I've attached a sample of what the database look like.
If anyone could give me an hand I would be most gratefull!!

Thank you in advance,
Miguel Pereira

[Pete_UK]

Your example contains only one data sheet, but you need to have something else to compare with, i.e. the sheet from yesterday. Then you could use a MATCH formula to see if today's code existed in yesterday's sheet, something like:

=IF(ISNA(MATCH(A2,yesterday!A:A,0)),"new","same")

You can't use the current sheet to find out what codes have been removed - rather, you would have a similar formula in yesterday's sheet to see which codes are not present in the current sheet, i.e.:

=IF(ISNA(MATCH(A2,current!A:A,0)),"removed","same")

Both these formulae would be put on row 2 of their respective sheet in an appropriate column, and copied down to the bottom of your data.

Hope this helps.

Pete

[Miguel Pereira]

I can't thank you enough for this help, you've just made my day!
I think this will solve my needs.

The yesterday and today is exactly what I was planing on doing.

Be happy, and keep on helping others.