1. Chat: Build Models in Minutes with Excel AI

A. Prompting

• Build and summarise models by using natural language to prompt Tracelight.

• Prompt Tracelight as if you were talking to the analyst who built the sheet.

• Chat history below the chat box allows you to access older chats.

• You can also prompt a web search with Tracelight for online research.

B. Modes

• Agent: build automatically according to instructions - use for speed and convenience.

• Plan: optimise your prompts so Tracelight follows your intent as closely as possible.

• Control is a legacy deprecated mode - we recommend you use Agent and Plan.

C. Import Documents

• Click and drag into the chat to import PowerPoint, Word, Excel, PDF, image files, CSVs, and more. The file appears in a labelled panel in the chat as shown below for the 10K.

2. Review & Audit

A. Review

• Once Tracelight has built your analysis, click the "Review changes" button at the bottom of the chat to see each component of Tracelight's changes.

B. Audit

• To check for errors in your sheet, click on the "Audit" tab, and then click the "Run error check" button. Tracelight highlights formulas it thinks are mistakes or not following best practices.

• Click on an error checking run to examine each error by severity; Tracelight has a summary of the error.

• To navigate to a relevant cell, just click the cells highlighted in the summary.

• Tracelight also includes a fix in the summary - press the "Fix it" button to implement it.

• Click on "Live checks" to instantly filter and view potential errors on your current sheet.

3. Trace: Understand your Model

A. Overview

• You can navigate to Trace tab either at the top of the Tracelight box, or by clicking the Trace button on an error summary in Audit.

• Trace helps you understand how different formulae and cells are linked to each other.

B. How to Use Trace

• In the top view, is the navigation pane, which clockwise from top left shows; model section, column, value, and row for the relevant cell.

• Toggle between views of the formulas by changing precedents; range (cells referenced in the formulas), values (values in the cell), and labels (what the cells mean).

• Hit Enter on a cell reference to see the precedent of that cell.

• Navigate through the precedent tree with shortcuts as shown below.

• At the bottom, you can also see an explanation of the formula.

4. Charts, Tables, Export & Dashboards

A. Charts and Tables

• You can prompt Tracelight to build a wide variety of charts and tables, including using python and html.

B. Export

• To export into another format - like Powerpoint, Word, CSV or PDF, just prompt Tracelight in the chat.

C. Interactive HTML Dashboards

• You can ask Tracelight to build shareable, interactive dashboards with HTML in the chat.

5. Workflows & Instructions

A. Workflows: Automate Your Repetitive Tasks

• By typing "/" in the chat, you can open up the Workflows dropdown. Here, you can automate your repetitive tasks in Excel by clicking "Create Workflow", and then saving your prompt for the relevant task there.

• To use this prompt, just type "/" and select the workflow.

B. Instructions and Style Guides

• Tracelight makes formatting specific to your required style automatic; click the user instructions button (the person icon) to prompt Tracelight to create a style guide based on your current sheet.

• If you have other preferences, you can add them by clicking "Create Instruction".

6. Compare Spreadsheets

A. Compare Spreadsheets

• To compare two versions of the same spreadsheet, click the Tracelight icon above the chat, or go to https://app.tracelight.ai/compare, where you can then drop in the two versions of the model to see the differences.

• You can then see every change made in the spreadsheet, as well as an AI summary of their impact on your model.

Shortcuts

Taskpane

Trace Tree

Chat