Pivot table

A pivot table is a table of statistics that summarizes the data of a more extensive table (such as from a database, spreadsheet, or business intelligence program). This summary might include sums, averages, or other statistics, which the pivot table groups together in a meaningful way. A pivot table is a table of statistics that summarizes the data of a more extensive table (such as from a database, spreadsheet, or business intelligence program). This summary might include sums, averages, or other statistics, which the pivot table groups together in a meaningful way. Pivot tables are a technique in data processing. They enable a person to arrange and rearrange (or 'pivot') statistics in order to draw attention to useful information. Although pivot table is a generic term, Microsoft trademarked PivotTable in the United States in 1994. In their book Pivot Table Data Crunching, Bill Jelen and Mike Alexander refer to Pito Salas as the 'father of pivot tables'. While working on a concept for a new program that would eventually become Lotus Improv, Salas noted that spreadsheets have patterns of data. A tool that could help the user recognize these patterns would help to build advanced data models quickly. With Improv, users could define and store sets of categories, then change views by dragging category names with the mouse. This core functionality would provide the model for pivot tables. Lotus Development released Improv in 1991 on the NeXT platform. A few months after the release of Improv, Brio Technology published a standalone Macintosh implementation, called DataPivot (with technology eventually patented in 1999). Borland purchased the DataPivot technology in 1992 and implemented it in their own spreadsheet application, Quattro Pro. In 1993 the Microsoft Windows version of Improv appeared. Early in 1994 Microsoft Excel 5 brought a new functionality called a 'PivotTable' to market. Microsoft further improved this feature in later versions of Excel: In 2007 Oracle Corporation made PIVOT and UNPIVOT operators available in Oracle Database 11g. For typical data entry and storage, data usually appear in flat tables, meaning that they consist of only columns and rows, as in the following portion of a sample spreadsheet showing data on shirt types: