alternative for nested IF function?

[excelqueen]

Hi There,
I want to know if there is a better alternative to the multiple IF construct? This is what i am trying to do - based on the value selected in a cell i want to autofill the other corresponding cells in the same row.

Example - if A1 (representing month) = October, November or December then B1 should be autofilled with a value "Q4 - Last quarter of the year"

Will appreciate help on this!

[inarbeth]

You can do this with a lookup table. On an empty area of your worksheet or on another sheet, create a column of the twelve months. In the next column to the right type in the descriptions you want, e.g. Q1 - First quarter of the year, Q2 - Second quarter of the year etc. Thus:
January Q1 - First quarter of the year
FebruaryQ1 - First quarter of the year
March Q1 - First quarter of the year
April Q2 - Second quarter of the year
May Q2 - Second quarter of the year
June Q2 - Second quarter of the year
July Q3 - Third quarter of the year
August Q3 - Third quarter of the year
SeptemberQ3 - Third quarter of the year
October Q4 - Last quarter of the year
NovemberQ4 - Last quarter of the year
DecemberQ4 - Last quarter of the year

Select the range containing all the 24 cells. Name it CalendarRange.
In B1 type =VLOOKUP(A1,CalendarRange,2,0). Autofill this down if you want to repeat the lookup on other rows. If you change the month in A1, B1 will change automatically.

This Message was edited by: inarbeth on 2002-05-05 01:34 ]

[ This Message was edited by: inarbeth on 2002-05-05 01:37 ]

[Schrödinger’s cat]

Or in B1 put =IF(OR(A1="October",A1="November",A1="December"),"Q4 - Last quarter of year","")

[excelqueen]

Awesome! both the suggestions work. thanks a ton for your help!

[Chris Davison]

On 2002-05-05 01:36, Schrödinger’s cat wrote:
Or in B1 put =IF(OR(A1="October",A1="November",A1="December"),"Q4 - Last quarter of year","")

a slight timesaver :

=IF(OR(A1={"October","November","December"}),"Q4 - Last quarter of year","")