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Summarizing Data: Maximum, Minimum, Range
4:02Before doing any data analysis, you'll want to get acquainted with your data. In this video we'll discuss the maximum, minimum, and range.
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It's time to start analyzing our data.
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One of the first steps in any data
analysis is to summarize the data.
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By summarizing the data, we give
others the ability to make decisions
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based on this data without needing
to see the data for themselves.
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Pretend you are a race organizer and
you're trying to figure out
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how late you'll need to have the roads
closed near the finish line.
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To figure that out, you could use
the race results from last year,
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find who came in last and
then use their time.
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Or if you had the stats for
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the race you could just use the maximum
finishing time and be done with it.
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Let's look at a couple ways
that we can summarize our data.
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We've already talked about the maximum,
which is the highest number in a set.
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But we've also got minimum,
for the lowest number.
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And the distance between
the two is called the range.
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So this set has a max of eleven,
a min of two and a range of nine.
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Back in Google Sheets, let's create
a new sheet to keep our summaries.
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Click the plus sign on the bottom
left to create a new sheet.
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Then, let's double-click on the sheet's
name and rename it to Summary.
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Also, while we're here, let's double click
on Sheet1 and rename this to 2017 as well.
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Next, on the Summary tab,
let's add a few labels in column A.
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Let's type Min in A1,
Max in A2 and Range in A3.
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Then let's go ahead and
bold those by highlighting the cells and
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using Cmd or Ctrl + B.
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All right, now let's find those values and
put them in column B.
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To figure out the minimum overall time,
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since our list is an order,
we could just take the winner's time.
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But let's figuring out the shortest
time by using functions.
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To use a function, start with an equal
sign and then start typing your function.
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So in B1 let's type =, and
then type min, and there we go.
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That will give us the minimum
value in a numeric data set.
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Hit Enter to select it.
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Now we need to pass in every single
finishing time from the results
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on the first sheet.
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To do this, with Min still selected,
let's switch to the first sheet
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and select the first time in
the official time column.
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Then, if you're on Windows or
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Linux, hit Ctrl + Shift + Down to
select all the way to the bottom.
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If you're on Mac, use Cmd + Shift + Down.
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Or if you want to use the mouse,
after selecting the first entry,
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just scroll to the bottom and
Shift+Click on the last item in column S.
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Either way, once you've got all
the data in column S selected,
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hit Enter to calculate the minimum.
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And let's double check that that's
also the first time in the list.
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So 2 hours, 9 minutes and 37 seconds.
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Yep, that checks out.
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Now, before we calculate the max,
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let's first copy the range we
ended up using for the min.
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Let's open up B1, and
copy all of this orange text.
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This is the range that we're
calculating the minimum of.
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And by copying it we won't need to
select it again for our max calculation.
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So on B2, let's type, =max,
hit Enter to select it.
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Paste in our Range and
hit Enter again to calculate the Max.
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Finally for the Range, let's just set
this equal to the Max minus the Min.
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Perfect.
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In the next video, we'll look at a few
ways to define the middle of our data.
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