Inheriting Cell Formatting

When formatting cells in a grid, you can inherit formatting from a cell and apply it to another cell. The following formatting options can be inherited in a grid: number, alignment, font, borders and shading, and replace.

Note:

If you are working with a row and column template in the current grid, you must establish your format inheritance options before saving a row and column template. For more information, see Creating Row and Column Templates.

  To inherit cell formatting:

  1. Open a report that contains a grid, or create a new grid with formatted rows or columns.

  2. Select the cells to which you want to apply inherited formatting.

  3. Select Format, and then Cells.

  4. Click the Inherit Formatting tab.

  5. In the Inherit These Formatting Options area, expand the plus (+) symbols and click the box to select the formatting options to inherit, including number, alignment, font, borders and shading, and replace text.

    Note:

    To select all formatting options, click Select All. To deselect all formatting options, click Unselect All.

    Tip:

    To specify the row or column from which you want to inherit formatting, you must first specify the options you want to inherit (number, alignment, font, borders and shading, and replace).

  6. In the Inherit formatting from area, select the row or column from which to inherit formatting, using the up and down arrows. Choose from the following inheritance options:

    • Select the current row and another column

      Tip:

      Use the up and down arrow keys to make your selection.

    • Select the current column and another row

    • Select another row and another column

      Note:

      You can only inherit from a cell that does not have previously defined inheritance. For example, if you format column A and then inherit formatting into column B, you cannot then inherit formatting from column B into column C. You can, however, format column A, select columns B and C, and inherit formatting for column B and C from column A.

  7. Click Apply.

  8. Click OK.

    Note:

    If you have inherited formatting and then modify the format of the cell to which you inherited formatting, the inheritance you established no longer applies. For example, if you inherit the font name property in cell A4 from cell B4 and you subsequently modify the font name in cell A4, the format inheritance no longer exists. This breaks the formatting link that was previously established between the two cells.