Hi Reader,

Happy New Year!

Another lap around the sun in the books. Wow, they go quickly don't they?

​2024 was my tenth year of working for myself in this weird little corner of the internet.

And although 2024 had its challenges, there was lots to be grateful for. I'm genuinely excited to see where we go in 2025.

Thank you for reading this newsletter and being part of that journey.

Undoubtedly the biggest technology story of 2024 was how fast AI tools are developing and changing the way we work.

In 2025, that will continue apace.

I expect we'll see even bigger changes in how we work with spreadsheets and data this year. We're shifting to a world where we interact with our data via natural language (i.e. prompting) rather than technical syntax (i.e. formulas and code). This lowers barriers and lets more people mine insights from their data, not just the technically proficient. And that's a good thing.

Welcome to the Google Sheets Tips newsletter #329, your Monday morning espresso, in spreadsheet form!

Since it's the new year, I figured we could explore the new year number: 2025.

Especially whilst we're still in that "doesn't it feel weird to write 2025 as the date?" phase.

2025 is a square number

Interestingly, anyone born in 1980, like me, will turn 45 this year.

And 2025 is 45².

In our Google Sheets, we can calculate squares a few different ways:

=45 * 45

= PRODUCT(45,45)

= MULTIPLY(45,45)

= 45 ^ 2

= POW(45,2)

= POWER(45,2)

The POW function (a shorter version of the POWER function) raises a number to a power.

​PRODUCT and MULTIPLY multiply two numbers together.

2025 is also the sum of the numbers 1 to 9, squared.

I.e. (1 + 2 + ... + 9)² = 2025

which we can calculate with this formula:

=SUM(SEQUENCE(9)) ^ 2

2025 is also the sum of the cubed numbers 1 to 9.

I.e. 1³ + 2³ + ... + 9³ = 2025

which we can calculate in our Sheet as follows:

= ArrayFormula(SUM(SEQUENCE(9) ^ 3))

or by using a LAMBDA function:

=SUM(BYROW(SEQUENCE(9),LAMBDA(i,POW(i,3))))

Finally, here's an esoteric formula that prints the number 2025 as words in our Sheet:

= LET(x, GOOGLETRANSLATE( BAHTTEXT(2025)), LEFT(x, SEARCH(" baht",x)))

Back to a... ahem, more practical Google Sheets tip next week!

Cheers,
Ben

P.S. A year of doodles, animated at 30 frames a day​