How to put multiply in a formula?

I should mention... Numbers will change the characters you type in the formula editor for multiplication and division...

If you type:

A1*2

Numbers will actually present:

A1x2

When you type the division operator, Numbers changes it to the obelus:

I typed:

=A1/2

RickAu wrote:

Hi thanks, everyone It's just that I forgot to use an * instead of an x

Now I can continue. I knew there was a simple answer !

Hi Rick,

Just a heads-up:

the multiply symbol looks like a lower case x, but it isn't. Here in Unicode (ASCII)

We must type * and Numbers changes the symbol.

If we type lower case x, Numbers will not recognise it as multiply.

That may seem non-intuitive, but calculators have used ÷ and × for years!

Regards,

Ian.

Click in the cell that you want the answer to appear in, and type an '=' sign on your keyboard. the formula editor should appear as a small window over the top of your spreadsheet cells. When using that, you can click on a cell in the sheet to enter its reference in the editor panel. Click on the cell that has the value you want to multiple and divide, and you'll see it appear in the editor... but you need to type a few things to get this to work.

Type the word 'SUM' and then open a parenthesis '(', then click on the cell with the value. Next, hold Shift and tap the '8' key to enter an asterisk and then close the parenthesis ')'... after that, click on the forward slash '/' and type the number '2', then hit enter to close the panel. It'll look a bit like this (obviously, with your own values and cell references it'll be different):

Once you close the panel, the result will appear in the cell that you first typed '=' into.

NOTE - the asterisk and forward slash are changed to visually look like the 'x' and ÷ signs... do not try to type those, use asterisk and forward slash!

To multiply a cell by 3 and divide by 2 you have to first put the multiplication into brackets. For example, this would look like (A1*3). Then, to divide this you need to add /2 to divide the result of the multiplication by 2. The formula would then become (A1*3)/2

Hope this helps.

on computers, and all spreadsheet programs I know about, the following are the the mathematical operators:

'+' is the additional operator

'-' is the subtraction operator

'*' (the asterisk) is the multiplication operator

'/' (the forward slash) is the division operator

And there is no need to put parentheses in that equation because * and / are in the same hierarchical level which means they are executed in order of appearance. They are one level above + and - which means they are computed before them.

This means that A1 * 3 / 2 is the same as (A1 * 3) / 2 or A1 * (3 / 2).

However, A1 + 3 / 2 is NOT the same as (A1 + 3) / 2, because without parentheses it evaluates as A1 + (3 / 2).

2 + 3 * 4 = 14

(2 + 3) * 4 = 20

Good ole PEMDAS!

Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally

Yellowbox wrote:

Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally

Ah! Yes. Weirdly, I remember there was an acronym but could only remember the actual words.