Excel and CSV connections in Tableau - Cell-by-Cell Formula Trace

Sample Data

Sample sales data from an Excel or CSV file showing products and their sales numbers.

Cell	Value
A1	Product
B1	Sales
A2	Apples
B2	100
A3	Bananas
B3	150
A4	Cherries
B4	200

Formula Trace

SUM([Sales])

Step 1: [Sales] = {100, 150, 200}

Step 2: SUM({100, 150, 200})

Cell Reference Map

   A       B
1 Product  Sales
2 Apples   100
3 Bananas  150
4 Cherries 200

[Sales] column cells B2, B3, B4 feed into the SUM formula.

The formula references the Sales column cells B2 to B4 from the Excel or CSV data source.

Result

   A       B       C
1 Product  Sales   Total Sales
2 Apples   100     450
3 Bananas  150
4 Cherries 200

The Total Sales measure shows the sum of all sales values from the Excel or CSV connection.

Sheet Trace Quiz - 3 Questions

What does the formula SUM([Sales]) calculate?

A The highest sales value

B The average sales value

C The total of all sales values from the data

D The number of products

Key Result

SUM([Column]) adds all numeric values in the specified column from the connected Excel or CSV data.