This first chapter illustrates the use of a worksheet, data menu, and calculator tools. We start by bringing data in from other applications and then working on it using other data tools within the calculator menu. The emphasis is on getting data into Minitab and reformatting into a preferred structure for later studies.

As you can see in the preceding screenshot, Minitab prefers working in columns. This can be structurally a different approach to Excel, where the data is held in cells. We will start by bringing our data in from Excel and Access, and then move into reformatting the data. It should be noted that copying and pasting into Minitab can be a perfectly acceptable method of moving data from one application to another.