What is the purpose of "Expand formatting" in Calc?

[realitix]

Hello,

I am wondering what is the purpose of the “Expand formatting” option (in Options > LibreOffice Calc > General > Expand formatting).

In the documentation, we can read:

Specifies whether to
automatically apply the formatting
attributes of the selected cell to the
empty adjacent cells. If, for example,
the contents of the selected cell have
the bold attribute, this bold
attribute will also apply to adjacent
cells. Cells that already have a
special format will not be modified by
this function. You can see the range
in question by pressing the Ctrl + *
(multiplication sign on the number
pad) shortcut. This format also
applies to all new values inserted
within this range. The normal default
settings apply to cells outside this
range.

What is the purpose of this option ? Can you give me a use case where it’s useful.

Thank you for your answer,
Sincerely,
Jean-Sébastien

[EasyTrieve]

This is just a guess, because I’ve never deliberately investigated it, but it helps you enter stuff in spreadsheets. I’ve seen it at work. It’s great. Go to add something next to an adjacent cell, and it matches the formatting like magic. Sometimes it does too much, but often it does exactly what you want.