Excel Links – Winner Takes it all Edition

Remember the Sales Visualization Challenge? We got 32 extremely good dashboards submitted and finally you voted Alex Kerin’s entry as the winner. So when I informed Alex that he is the winner, I also asked him to send me a pic of him with the iPod Touch that he won. Yesterday, he sent it to me. So here it is, in all its glory, the proof that winners take it all.

This should motivate all of us to fight harder for the next challenges.

Okay, off to this week’s excel links.

A brilliant use of Excel – Chess Game Viewer using Scatter Plots

Daniel Ferry recently started an advanced excel blog and he is already in to full force. In this particular article, he shares a chess game viewer with us made purely using scatter plots. Excellent (and *really* awesome) stuff. Go check it out to see what is possible in excel.

A good round up of Active-x Controls in Excel

Jimmy tells us how the Active X controls in Excel work by showing examples and explaining each control. He has a file for download too. Active X controls have some special uses and they can be easily handled from VBA code.

A cumulative spending chart goes crazy and Chartbuster rightly fixes it

I have to give it to Jon for marching ahead with the chartbusters torch even 8 months after launching the series. (recap: In June 2009, Jon and I started the Chartbusters series to bust ugly charts). In this episode, Jon cures a seriously ailing cumulative spending chart. The treatment is as simple as it can get. Very useful charting advice as usual.

When should we celebrate the “Spreadsheet day”?

Debra is asking an all important question, when should we celebrate the Spreadsheet day? It is required to connect various excel users. Few people suggested that it should be on the launch date of Lotus 1-2-3 while others said it should be on VisiCalc launch date. When do you think we should celebrate the spreadsheet day? [related: history of excel – timeline chart]

Data in, Brilliance out @ Tableau Public

Tableau, one of the most well known products for making stunning visualizations has launched a public site. Here you can upload your data and make visualizations instantly, a la Many Eyes. As the name suggests, the outputs of this will be Public and anyone can see them. I have heard so many good things about Tableau, but I never used it personally (it is prohibitively expensive for individual use). I am going to try the Public thing, I suggest you should too.

Send me an excel tip or link

If you have an excel tip or URL that you wish to share with rest of us, please send them to me at chandoo.d @ gmail.com (or leave a comment on this post). I will try to include your tips on the next episode of excel links.

Hello Awesome...

My name is Chandoo. Thanks for dropping by. My mission is to make you awesome in Excel & your work. I live in Wellington, New Zealand. When I am not F9ing my formulas, I cycle, cook or play lego with my kids. Know more about me.

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