Linking tables in Power Point - how to handle tables that grow or shrink in size (rows only)

[skyrat]

I am pasting tables from Excel as a link into Power Point which works fine, until I add or delete rows to a table.

Is there a way to resolve this ?

I tried using 'Insert Table' hoping that the link would reference the table itself, rather than a cell range. But this did not work.

To clarify the issue, below are 4 tables in Excel...

Each table has to be pasted as a separate link in Power Point, because its position on the page could be anywhere...

Now if I add rows to some tables and delete rows from other tables in Excel...

The linked tables in Power Point are all wrong, so I have to delete them and paste as a link again...

If there were only one or a few tables I could copy and paste as a new link again, but the problem is I have LOTS of tables so doing this is a tedious, manual task.

And the tables are regularly being modified (only in terms of rows) so it's now becoming an issue.

I have many sheets with various numbers of tables, all of different sizes (in terms of rows).

The Power Point link is obviously just referencing the cells as a range e.g. B2:I27...

I need this link to be dynamic, so that if I add or remove rows to the table referenced as B2:I27, then it automatically updates that change to the pasted link in Power Point.

This is why I was hoping 'Insert Table' would work so it references it as 'Table12' for example, rather than B2:I27.

 

[severynm]

I am not 100% sure of this, but I noticed that your tables are all on top of each other in the same columns. I don't entirely know how the linking works exactly, but I wonder if it is based off a cell reference in the sheet, and changing the relative location of the table within the worksheet (i.e. the call location of the upper left corner of the table) is "breaking" things.

What if you had the tables side by side instead? Or even better, in different worksheets?

 

[skyrat]

What if you had the tables side by side instead? Or even better, in different worksheets?

This is the only way I could think of resolving it but it would not be feasible.

There are hundreds of tables, so having each table side by side or on different sheets would make it very difficult to manage in excel

 

[skyrat]

I found the solution so thought I would share

I selected the table in Excel and then selected 'Define Name', in the screenshot below I called it 'MyTable1'

With 'MyTable1' selected, I copied and pasted as a link in powerpoint.

I did the same with every table and now if I add or delete rows from a table, it does not mess the other tables up in the power point and the table I modify grows or shrinks in the power point.

I also noticed something else....

When I pasted the links without naming the tables, powerpoint shows that each link has an absolute path so if the Excel file is not in that path it cant find the link, even if the Excel file is placed in the same folder as the Powerpoint file. This is a problem people have asked about online but with no solution other than manually changing the link or using a VBA script.

However, when I pasted the links after naming the tables, if the Excel file is in the same folder as the Powerpoint it finds the link even though the absolute path does not even exist.

So naming tables and pasting as a link has fixed the absolute path problem too !