Question

Whithin the same document (workbook), whenever I create named ranges, I have something like Sheet1!A1 but it is always refering to Sheet1. Is there any way in which I could refer to the current spreadsheet instead?

Something like this!A1 which will turn into Sheet1!A1 if I’m currently in Sheet1 or Sheet200!A1 if I’m in Sheet200.

The purpuse is to reuse the same formulas (with already have the named intervals) in all the spreadsheets of the workbook. I found it rather stupid this global and fixed reference. This way I always have to recreate my formulas for each spreadsheet.

Answer 1

A named range refers to a specific range of cells on a specific sheet – I don’t see that changing anytime soon.

But here is a custom function you can put into your spreadsheet’s script that will “localize” ranges for you. This code is also available for download in this Gist.

/*
 * Return a string with the A1 notation for the given range, with
 * the sheet reference removed. To use in spreadsheet functions,
 * enclose with INDIRECT().
 *
 * Example: 
 *   =index(INDIRECT(localizeNamedRange(NamedRange1)),12,4)
 *
 * @param {string} rangeName  The name of an existing range in the
 *                        active spreadsheet. It does not matter which
 *                        sheet the range was defined for.
 *
 * @return {string}       The cell range from the provided rangeName,
 *                        in A1 notation.
 */
function localizeNamedRange( rangeName ) {
  var sheet = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet();

  // Get range by name
  var origRange = sheet.getRangeByName(rangeName);

  // Get notation for the range, without sheet reference.
  var notation = "";
  if (origRange !== null) {
    notation = origRange.getA1Notation();
  }

  // Return range in A1 notation
  debugger;   // pause to examine if running in debugger
  return ( notation );
}

Here’s an example. NamedRange1 has been defined as “Sheet1!A10:A22”. If we put =localizeNamedRange(NamedRange1) in a cell, it will return A10:A22, without the reference to Sheet1. That’s a string, so if we want to use it in a formula that expects a range, we need to convert it – and do that, we use the built-in function INDIRECT().

On Sheet1 we have a formula in cell A3 that calculates the average value of NamedRange1. Here’s how to define that formula to make it localize-able:

(A3) =AVERAGE(INDIRECT(localizeNamedRange(NamedRange1));

If you now copy Sheet1 into a new Sheet2, you’ll find that the formula still works, and that it performs its calculations on the data on Sheet2, even though the Named Range refers to Sheet1.