Hide and go sort

Posted by: Steven Saviano, Software Engineer, Google Docs & Spreadsheets

We've gotten an unprecedented amount of feedback since we launched the redesigned document list last month. As promised, we're considering all your suggestions -- positive and, ahem, "constructive." Today we've added two new features that topped your lists: sorting and hiding.

• Sort your documents: Click on column headers to sort by document name, date changed, starred/unstarred and shared with. Click twice to change from ascending to descending order.
• Hide is back: The archive feature is back, now called "hide." You'll notice a Hide button in the document list toolbar that will remove selected documents from view. You can always get back to hidden documents by selecting "Hidden" on the left. It's easy to unhide a document by selecting "Unhide" or simply dragging the document to a different folder.

As always, keep those suggestions coming in our help group.

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Ten new languages

Posted by: Ken Norton, Product Manager, Google Docs & Spreadsheets

We thought you might like to know that we've added support for another ten languages to Google Docs & Spreadsheets. We're now available in Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish, Czech, Ukrainian, Hungarian, Thai, Vietnamese, and Indonesian. To change your default language, click the "Settings" link from the top right of your document list. This means that now we know how to say "collaborate" in 25 languages!

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Array Formulas without Ctrl-Shift-Enter

Posted by: John Danaher, Engineer - Google spreadsheets

If you're an expert spreadsheet user, you might be familiar with the powerful and obscure feature known as array formulas. They're powerful because they let you replace an entire column of formulas with a single array formula that does all the calculations in one place. And they're obscure because you've always had to hit Ctrl-Shift-Enter to create one, and, well, who's ever going to discover that on their own?

It's now a lot simpler to create an array formula in Google Spreadsheets. If you want to create a multiple-output formula (like TRANSPOSE or MMULT), just enter the formula normally and hit enter. As if by magic, the entire output of the formula will appear. And if you want a multiple-input formula, wrap the whole formula in the ARRAYFORMULA function, like so: =ARRAYFORMULA(SUM(IF(A1:A10>B1:B10, A1:A10, B1:B10))).

And if you've never heard of array formulas but we've piqued your interest, take a look at our array formulas help page that explains them in a little more detail.

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Want spreadsheet filtering? Try this.

Posted by: Alex Komoroske, Intern - Google Docs & Spreadsheets team

When I joined the Google spreadsheets team in New York City as a Product Manager intern this summer, I let on to the fact that I loved to do programming on the side. My manager's eyes lit up and before I knew it he introduced me to the Google Spreadsheets API. He showed me a quick and (very) dirty javascript program he had written that would allow spreadsheet users to filter their view of a spreadsheet--that is, to view only rows that met some simple criteria. His code wasn't quite bloggable, so he invited me to make a 'real' spreadsheet filter application.

The API gave me access to practically all my spreadsheet data, so I had the flexibility to do whatever I had in mind. Within a few hours, I had a pretty powerful little application that could filter using easy dropdowns on each column. But I wasn't done -- I wanted more control over filtering. I added an expression parser that understands "fuzzy" filters -- things like "contains North or New" -- just as well as it understands more precise (but intimidating) traditional expressions.

I clearly went a little overboard with my spreadsheet application, but the point is that the API puts a lot of power into my hands--and yours. If you've got any kind of programming experience, why don't you give it a try ?

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