Reduce number of cells in Excel

Question

I have a spreadsheet managing a list of groups in time slots. Imagine the below are cells:

0830-0845, Bob Hoskins, Jack Table, Phil Cup
0845-0900, Bob Hoskins, J         


        

Answer 1

I performed these steps as per Excel 2010, but this should work for other versions as well (with some minor changes).

Steps:

a) Select all data cells b) Goto Data --> Data Tools --> Remove Duplicates c) Seems that there are 4 columns in your data file, so in the popup you'll see 4 columns (say Column A, Column B, Column C, and Column D). Check all columns except Column A (i.e. where your timestamps exist). Press OK.

Note: In this solution, the first timestamp (and not the range) will show up for each unique line e.g.

0830-0845, Bob Hoskins, Jack Table, Phil Cup
0945-1000, Jane Dunnit, Henry Badass    
1030-1045, Terry Turbo      
1100-1115, Simon Car, Maggie Blah, Jack Paper