Copying and Pasting Cell Values

In tables and grids in SAP Analytics Cloud, you can copy and paste cell values, the underlying values of their leaf members, and formulas. You can also create references between cells.

Data can be copied within or across grids and tables, and you can also copy data from an external source.

In a table, you can paste data into cells that can receive data input.

You can also cut and paste values. For details, see Cutting and Pasting Cell Values.

Copying Data From an External Source

You can copy and paste from an external source, such as an Excel spreadsheet. To do this, select the source cells in the external data source and press Ctrl+C in Windows or Cmd+C on a Mac, then select the target cells and press Ctrl+V or Cmd+V.

Copying Data in a Table

When copying data within a table, there are two types of paste operations: pasting underlying values or pasting overall values.

When you copy a source cell with model data, all of the underlying values that aggregate up to it are copied as well. By default, all of these values are pasted if possible.

For example, you might copy a Q1 member and paste it to Q2 for the same version. On the month level for a calendar year, the value for January will be copied to April, the value for February will be copied to May, and the value for March will be copied to June.

Underlying data can be pasted when the following conditions are met:

You are copying across two time periods at the same level, such as December and January, or you are copying across two different leaf members, such as from one sales manager to another.

Note

If you are using non-standard user-managed time hierarchies on the date dimension, the target cell and source cell need to have the same time hierarchy. For example, if you are copying data from December to January, and there are more weeks in December, the underlying values won’t be pasted.
The source cell that you copied is visible.

When these two conditions are not met, only overall values are pasted. In this case, the behavior is the same as typing the value into the cell. The distribution of the copied value among the leaf members is determined by the existing proportions between those members if the cell already has a value.

Note

Copying and pasting underlying values isn’t supported with a BPC live data connection. You can still copy and paste overall values, though.

If you want to paste overall values only, you can select Start of the navigation path Edit Next navigation step Paste Overall Values Only End of the navigation path from the toolbar. You can also right-click and choose Paste Overall Values Only from the context menu.

Note

Choosing Paste or Paste Overall Values Only from the context menu does not support pasting data from external sources such as Excel.

Copying with Percentage Data

You can copy and paste to and from table cells that show percentages. When copying and pasting between percentage cells and numerical cells in a table or in an external spreadsheet, 100% is treated as a numerical value of 1.

Copying and Pasting Multiple Values

A rectangular group of selected cell values can also be copied and pasted to multiple cells in a table.

Note

If the area that you are pasting to contains cell references, you cannot paste multiple cells to that area. You will need to copy and paste values individually, or paste to a different area.

This type of operation can also be performed by selecting a source area and dragging the bottom right corner of the region horizontally or vertically to include the target area. For example, you could select several account values for January and February 2019 and drag them to the December 2019 cell to paste the January and February data to alternating months for the rest of the year. If the target region is larger than the source region, the copied values are repeated. If the target region is smaller, not all of the source values are pasted.

Copying and Pasting with Empty Cells

The destination cells can be booked values, unbooked values, or a mix of both.

When copying from a grid or an external spreadsheet, cells that are empty contain the en dash (–) character, or contain the minus (-) character are treated as unbooked. You can therefore copy and paste data from an external spreadsheet to a region of unbooked cells while keeping some of the target cells unbooked. Pasting an unbooked value will replace the booked cell with an unbooked cell, and delete the underlying values.

Copying and Pasting with Custom Time Hierarchies

In some cases, it is possible to copy and paste underlying values to non-leaf members with different time hierarchies. For example, you might want to copy between months with different amounts of days. This is supported if the date dimension is system-managed.

If your model is using non-standard user-managed time hierarchies, only the overall values can be pasted to cells with different time hierarchies. Refer to Customize Date Dimensions for more information about customizing date dimensions.

Pasting to More Than One Account or Measure

The target cells can belong to different accounts, as long as they use the same aggregation type. Note that copied values won’t have their signs flipped if there are conflicting target account types, such as income and expenses.

You can also paste to multiple measures in a model with measures.

Pasting to More Than One Hierarchy Level

If you paste to multiple levels of the same hierarchical dimension, values are pasted only to the child members in the target cells, and the cells for parent members are calculated by aggregation. For example, if you paste to an area that contains values for Q1, January, February, and March, then only January, February, and March are updated with the copied values. The new value for Q1 is calculated by aggregating the monthly values.

Avoiding Slow Performance

When there are multiple dimensions in the table, you can paste to different sets of members for each dimension. To avoid slow performance, you'll be notified when you try to paste to an area that includes a large number of different sets.

For more information on improving performance when conducting mass data entry, refer to Performance Considerations.

Copying and Pasting on Calculations

You can paste values to a calculated measure or account if you've defined an inverse formula for it.

Pasting to currency conversions is also supported. For a model with measures, you can copy and paste values to or from base currency measures and conversion measures. However, the values won't be converted. See Plan with Currency Conversion for details.

Pasting to Aggregated Accounts

In some cases, you can paste underlying values to an empty aggregated account that has calculated subaccounts.

The cells of the calculated subaccounts do not receive any values directly, but the rest of the data is copied as usual. If the copied data includes calculation inputs, the calculation will show the same values in the target cells.

For example, you may have created a blank version with an empty top-level account like Income Statement, which has several calculated subaccounts. To quickly fill in the values, you can copy and paste the value of this account, including its underlying records, from an existing version to the new version.

Say one of the Income Statement subaccounts is Revenue, calculated as Price * Units Sold. If Price and Units Sold don't aggregate up to Income Statement, Revenue doesn’t receive any values in the new version. To get those values, you can copy the calculation inputs: Price and Units Sold.

When you copy an aggregated account with calculated subaccounts, possible empty target cells will be highlighted. Source and target cells need to belong to the same account, and meet the requirements for copying and pasting details. Also, the target cell can't be a restricted measure or account.

Copying Across Restricted Measures

You can copy and paste between restricted accounts and measures. The target cells must be included in the restriction applied to the account or measure, however.

In many cases, such as when you are copying from one period to another in a forecast layout, it's helpful to copy the underlying values of the source cell. You can copy underlying values across restricted accounts and measures when a few conditions are met:

They are both restricted along the same dimensions.
A single member is chosen for each restricted dimension. For example, Date = "2020".
Each restricted dimension other than the date dimension is restricted to a leaf member.
The date dimension is restricted to the same level, for example, Date = 2019 and Date = 2020.