Power Query: Fabulously Fiddly Fill Down

Welcome to our Power Query blog. This week, I again look at the fill down problem I have considered for the past two weeks this time using a column copy solution.

You know the drill. I have some data on tents supplied by my imaginary company:

I would like to get this into a more standard format, by filling down the tent and awning types. I begin by extracting my data to Power Query by using the ‘From Table’ option on the ‘Get & Transform’ section of the Data tab.

I accept the defaults and tick the box to indicate that my table does indeed have headers.

I create a copy of the Awning column.

I fill down my copied column by selecting it and then right-clicking to choose ‘Fill’ and then ‘Down’.

Now, I may either use the value in Awning – Copy or Awning to create a new conditional column based on the value in Tent.

If the value in Tent is null, I am using the value in Awning – Copy, otherwise I am using the value in Awning. Once satisfied, I click ‘OK’ to create my Awning Rename column.

I can now remove Awning – Copy and remove Awning, so that I may use Awning Rename as my Awning column.

Finally, I select Tent and fill down, before moving Awning next to Tent.

I now have my data in the format I require.

Come back next time for more ways to use Power Query!