Cell.GetPrecedents

Cell.GetPrecedents method

Gets all references appearing in this cell’s formula.

public ReferredAreaCollection GetPrecedents()

Return Value

Collection of all references appearing in this cell’s formula.

Remarks

Returns null if this is not a formula cell.All references appearing in this cell’s formula will be returned no matter they are referenced or not while calculating. For example, although cell A2 in formula “=IF(TRUE,A1,A2)” is not used while calculating, it is still taken as the formula’s precedents.To get those references which influence the calculation only, please use GetPrecedentsInCalculation.

Examples

using System;
using System.Text;
using Aspose.Cells;

namespace AsposeCellsExamples
{
    public class CellMethodGetPrecedentsDemo
    {
        public static void Run()
        {
            Workbook workbook = new Workbook();
            Cells cells = workbook.Worksheets[0].Cells;
            
            // Set formula with precedents
            cells["A1"].Formula = "=B1+SUM(B1:B10)+[Book1.xls]Sheet1!A1";
            
            // Get all precedent references
            ReferredAreaCollection areas = cells["A1"].GetPrecedents();
            
            // Display each precedent reference
            foreach (ReferredArea area in areas)
            {
                StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
                if (area.IsExternalLink)
                {
                    sb.Append($"[{area.ExternalFileName}]");
                }
                sb.Append($"{area.SheetName}!");
                sb.Append(CellsHelper.CellIndexToName(area.StartRow, area.StartColumn));
                if (area.IsArea)
                {
                    sb.Append($":{CellsHelper.CellIndexToName(area.EndRow, area.EndColumn)}");
                }
                Console.WriteLine(sb.ToString());
            }
        }
    }
}

Cell.GetPrecedents