Conditional formating

[kojak43]

I thought this was working, but I guess not.
In cell N6 I placed the following under Conditional Formating. If cell value is equal to 1, make the cell red.
I also used a formula on cells A6, B6 and C6 that said formula =If($N6,1) Turn A6,B6 and C6 red as well.
I tested it using a 1 in N6 and it worked fine. If there is no number 1 in N6, none of the cells turn red. That is exactly what I want to happen.
However, I just changed N6 to a 2, and all the cells changed red. (A6:C6 + N6)
What am I doing wrong?

 

[kojak43]

Are your words true because we are dealing with Conditional Formatting?
i.e. "=IF($N6=1,"Turn a certain cell Red") [ modified ' to "" ]

doesn't return a logical value when $N6=1, only does so when $N6<>1. Conditional Formatting expects a logical value (TRUE or FALSE). "

What if it were entered as an if function, outside of Conditional Formatting? If the value in N6 was a 1, the logical value should say TRUE. As you wrote previously: Condition --> Action1, Action2
Is the condition IF($N6=1,[TRUE] Then Make A Cell Red, [If it is False, make the cell Empty]"")

I know what you are saying is correct, because I changed my spreadsheet, and it works. I am not being argumentative, I am just having a hard time understanding.

 

[Aladin Akyurek]

On 2002-04-09 15:26, kojak43 wrote:
Are your words true because we are dealing with Conditional Formatting?
i.e. "=IF($N6=1,"Turn a certain cell Red") [ modified ' to "" ]

doesn't return a logical value when $N6=1, only does so when $N6<>1. Conditional Formatting expects a logical value (TRUE or FALSE). "

Yep.

What if it were entered as an if function, outside of Conditional Formatting? If the value in N6 was a 1, the logical value should say TRUE. As you wrote previously: Condition --> Action1, Action2
Is the condition IF($N6=1,[TRUE] Then Make A Cell Red, [If it is False, make the cell Empty]"")

=IF($N6=1,"Make A Cell Red","")

put in a cell (outside Conditional Formatting), say in A1, this formula will produce/return the string "Make A Cell Red" in A1 whenever N6 contains 1 as value; The formula will compute a blank, i.e., "", whenever N6 houses a value other than 1. The crux is that

$N6=1

is the condition argument of IF. The condition must evaluate to TRUE for Action1 or must evaluate to FALSE for Action2.

I know what you are saying is correct, because I changed my spreadsheet, and it works. I am not being argumentative, I am just having a hard time understanding.

Don't worry: I don't take your questions as argumentative.

Aladin

 

[kojak43]

Thank you very much, Aladin for taking so much time to explain this to me.

I can see this stuff is not going to be easy.
It will be enjoyable, and with resources as yourself and others at Mr Excel, I might be able to get by without pulling out my hair.
Oh, too late!
Kojak.