Folks… I have an exciting news.
Excel School 2nd batch is now officially open.
If you want to know more about the program and join, head over the Excel School page.
In this post, you can find some information about Excel School and links to sign-up for the program. Read on, if you want to be even more awesome in Excel.
What is Excel School?
Excel School is an online Excel Training Program. It is full of real world examples. The aim of Excel School is to make beginners become productive and awesome in Excel.
How does it Work?
Once you pay the course fees and sign up for excel school,
- You will be given a userid and password to access excel school classroom
- Once you login to excel school, you will find links to all the material
- You can view lessons in any order or follow the order recommended by me
- You can download example excel files, home work and videos (if you sign up for download option) for further learning
- You can ask questions or discuss topics with other classmates thru comments
- Once every week, I will send you a news-letter with information, links and discuss course progress
Learn more about Excel School from this guide. [PDF]
Who should Join?
If you are a total newbie and dont know the difference between a cell and formula, Excel School is not for you.
If you are a wizard and can bake a cake with VBA, Excel School is not for you.
But, if you are someone who knows how to use Excel, write some formulas or make charts and looking for ways to boost your skill-set and productivity, Excel School is for you.
What topics are covered?
In Excel School, we cover these 12 topics in very detail.
| Excel School Topics: | |||
| Formulas | Formatting | Conditional Formatting | Basic Charting |
| Advanced Charting | Excel Tables | Pivot Tables | Data Validation, Filters |
| Advanced. Formulas | Importing External Data | Shortcuts, Productivity | Basic Form Controls, Macros |
Sign-up for Excel School Today:
Excel School comes in 2 flavors.
You can sign-up for ONLINE Option for $67 and access all the lessons online. You will be able to download example files, some bonus material. But you cannot download the videos.
For that, you need ONLINE+DOWNLOAD Option which costs $97. This gives you option to view lessons even after Excel School is closed.
See the below table to compare both options and choose the one you want. Click on the sign-up links to make a purchase.
[If you are from India, Click here to Pricing in INR]
Any Questions?
- Visit Excel School FAQs page to get answers.
- Visit Excel School sales page to get full details
- Checkout Testimonials from Past Students to know how it feels.
- Download a sample lesson and see it for yourself.
If you still have questions, write to me at chandoo.d @ gmail.com or post a comment here. I will be very glad to answer your questions.
See you in Excel School.
PS: Uff.. I finally finished all the work required for Excel School 2 signups. Regular broadcast will begin tomorrow.


















25 Responses to “Display Alerts in Dashboards to Grab User Attention [Quick Tip]”
I prefer the red,grey,light grey,black icon set. I've also used in-cell pie charts from Fabrice's Sparklines for Excel as an alert which could also provide another piece of information.
I prefer the red,grey,light grey,black icon set. I've also used in-cell pie charts from Fabrice's Sparklines for Excel as an alert which can also provide another piece of information.
For Excel 2007, your formula should do the same as the Excel 2003 version, so that non-alert rows are blank - if they are 0, the unnecessary green icon will show
Hi Chandoo,
Nice Post !! just to add something for EXL 2003, we can also 4 Ifs and link to the alert data
For Ex: If we have alert data in Cell A2 and want to split in 4 orders namely <25%, 25-50%, 50-75% and 75%< then we can following formula and put fonts as you have suggested :
=IF(A2<0.25,CHAR(153),IF(A2<=0.5,CHAR(155),IF(A2=0.76,CHAR(152)))))
And then using Conditional Formating we can dashboard reflected on different COLOURS as per their respective alert.
Best Regards
Rohit1409
Hi Chandoo,
Nice Post !!! just to add something for EXL 2003, we can also 4 Ifs and link to the alert data
For Ex: If we have alert data in Cell A2 and want to split in 4 orders namely <25%, 25-50%, 50-75% and 75%< then we can following formula and put fonts as you have suggested :
=IF(A2<0.25,CHAR(153),IF(A2<=0.5,CHAR(155),IF(A2=0.76,CHAR(152)))))
And then using Conditional Formating we can dashboard reflected on different COLOURS as per their respective alert.
Best Regards
Rohit1409
The Complete formula [Don't Know how it got cut ]
=IF(A2<0.25,CHAR(153),IF(A2<=0.5,CHAR(155),IF(A2=0.76,CHAR(152)))))
PS : Use in single line [I have split it to avoid cuts 😉 ]
Hi Chandoo..
why it is not displaying the complete formula..
anyways here is the balance
"=IF(A2<0.25,CHAR(153), IF(A2<=0.5,CHAR(155), IF(A2=0.76,CHAR(152)))))"
@Rohit... your formulas are fine. Just that the width of comment area is fixed and hence my website is cropping it at 640pixels. I just edited your formula and added few white spaces so that it wraps nicely.
Very good idea btw.. kudos!
Hi,
Maybe just go for 'bold' ; 'underline' or 'italic' to draw the users attention? Those methods (if those can be called methods) are used cross media type (books, journals, blogs, billboards, ...) to guide the readers eye to valuable information.
Just a basic thought
@Tom.. good idea..
[...] has a very nice writeup on how to add such alerts to dashboard sheets. Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)Divide your data set into workbooksHow to enforce [...]
Hi Chandoo,
You certainly grabbed my attention! although I wasn't sure what my brother (Suresh) and cousin (Shyam) were doing right, and I was doing wrong? 😉
I love your blog btw - Many thanks for all your hard work in unravelling the secrets and mysteries of Excel!
Best regards
Ramesh
I thought I saw an advertisment for a book about learning excel called excel himalaya or something. It cost about 35.00 us money but seemed to have the things I need to have my admin assistant to start to use. I was hoping to start with this book and then send her to school if she shows some interest and aptitude. Any help on this would be appreciated. Thanks
Great web site and information!!!!
@Jeff... checkout http://chandoo.org/wp/2010/08/25/excel-everest-review/
thanks, your website is awesome!
[...] Alerts to highlight focus areas [...]
[...] There are lots of numbers in this dashboard. I would suggest adding few more visualizations like showing indicators or applying conditional formatting or replacing a table with a chart. This would reduce the [...]
[...] is the same technique as alert icons in dashboard. Just that I also showed green [...]
[...] is the same technique as alert icons in dashboard. Just that I also showed green [...]
Hi Chandoo
Firstly thanks for all the cool tips on how to use Excel better.
I am new to the site and have a question which you may be able to assist with but dont know if these comment boxes are the best way of asking ?
I am looking at assets and trying to calculate the depreciation total by taking a year (say 2010) adding the expected life of the asset (say 10 years) then comparing that to a future date (say 2015) using an IF statement. The calculation in normal is - IF((year in col B (2010) plus 10years)>year 2015, add a years depreciation, otherwise leave blank). The converted date value does not appear able to add 10 years in order to compare it to 2015. Am I missing something ?
I use the “IF” Statement in conjunction with Conditional Formatting in MS Excel to give verbiage to alert one of a required action, dependant on a review date. This makes a visual stimulus, plus it clues one as to what the conditional format is trying to warn you about and what follow-up actions are required.
Wow, I'm really impressed with dashboards. I had no idea this stuff was even possible with excel. I'd like to offer an interactive dashboard to my customers, showing analytics of their data. I have a .pdf file with the datapoints. I'd like them to enter the data on my website, and be able to see their data. Is something like that possible.
Hi Chandoo,
I've recently purchased the package for both templates.
In the portfolio dashboard,under the calculations worksheet, I'm attempting to change the date range in the gantt chart to show only the range of the project that starts in late 2013. How do I do this?
Thanks
Adam
[...] is the same technique as alert icons in dashboard. Just that I also showed green [...]
Hi Chandoo,
I'm new at Excel Dashboard and found your blog really useful and helpful! It's very nice of you that you dedicate your time to do this.
Could you please explain how can I use Alerts based on dates on a Dashboar?
For example, if a target date is coming closer to the actual date, the alert is yellow or red.
I'd really appreciate some help!
Thank you
Where can I download the file Excel of Averall Statistics ???
Thanks a lot.