What does the ~ mean in formula =SUMIF(M13:M9087,"~**",E13:E9087)

[Dorothy]

What does the ~ mean in formula =SUMIF(M13:M9087,"~**",E13:E9087)?

 

[Mike H]

Hi,

the Tilde sign (~) is telling the sumif formula to look for the * symbol and
not treat that symbol as a wildcard.

Mike

 

[Mike H]

I should have added this only applies to the first *. The second * is being
treated as a wildcard so the sumif adds up if any cell in the criteria range
begins with * and has anything (or nothing) after it

 

[Dave Peterson]

Just to add...

There are a handful of worksheet functions that support wildcards (like
=countif() and =sumif()).

When you want to use one of those characters, but not have it treated as a
wildcard, you have to tell excel somehow--so you precede the character with that
tilde (~*, ~? and ~~).

And excel supports these same wildcards when you do an Edit|Replace or
Edit|Find.

If you want to replace an asterisk character, use ~* in the from string.
If you want to replace a question mark, use ~? in the from string.
If you want to replace a tilde (~), use ~~ in the from string.