Jo (wife) likes to watch Masterchef Australia (link), a cooking reality show every night. Even though I do not find contestant’s culinary combats comforting, occasionally I just sit and watch. You see, I like food.
The basic premise of the program is who cooks best in given time. To tell people how much time is left, they use a clock that looks like this:
The needle indicates how much time is left (much like a stop clock, with a small twist).
One day, while watching such intense battle, my mind went
- It be cool to make such a clock using hmm… Excel?
- Wouldn’t it be cool to grill a snapper & eat it than watch someone else do it
While I cannot share my snapper (or pretty much any other food item) with you, I can share my Masterchef style Excel clock with you. So behold,
Here comes the Masterchef style Clock in Excel
How is it cooked?
Don’t you worry. This recipe is not as complicated as a Masterchef recipe. With enough time & trigonometry, anyone can do it.
The clock (chart) has 2 parts. Dial & rotating hand.
While we can create both of them in one chart, I choose the path of least resistance i.e. Make one chart each for Dial & Hand and overlap them nicely.
Making the Dial
This is simpler than it looks. All we need is numbers 60 thru 5 (60,55,50…10,5) in a range & twelve 1s in another range. Then, we select both and make a radar chart. Once you adjust it, it should look like this:
Making the Rotating Hand
The hand is nothing but a line on a scatter plot with (0,0) as one point & (x,y) as another point. To calculate (x,y) we need to know how many degrees our hand should be rotated.
Hand of our clock starts at 60 and rotates clock-wise (duh!). That means if the time completed is 5, our clock’s hand should be 300 away from initial position.
Thus, x = sin(300), y = cos(300)
Same in Excel would be SIN(RADIANS(30)), COS(RADIANS(30))
For more on this calculation, refer to Spoke Chart Technique.
Running the clock (using VBA)
Our job is not done when the clock is assembled. We must give it batteries thru VBA.
The basic logic for running the clock is simple:
- When clock is running
- Check if it next second yet
- Move the hand (by modifying the value of done seconds)
- If not, just wait
You can see the code (and break it if you must) in the download file.
Download Excel Clock & Play with it
Click here to download this clock. Examine the macros assigned to the buttons. Play & Pause the clock.
Do you watch Masterchef?
Of course I am kidding. What I am really keen to know is do you make any clock / timer related things in Excel? I use timer features often to add animation, count-down features to my workbooks. They work really well.
What about you? Have you used such techniques? What is your experience? Please share using comments.
PS: If you must know, I prefer Amazing Race to Masterchef. I guess I get more pleasure watching people run around globe than run around in a kitchen.
More Charting Recipes
If you like a well cooked chart, we have got one too many in our pantry. Check out,
- Spoke chart in Excel
- Grammy bump chart
- Competitive Analysis Chart
- Polar Clock in Excel
- Data around the clock
Or consider joining my Excel School program to cook fine Excel workbooks & charts. Click here.
21 Responses to “Make a Pivot Table in Excel [15 Second Tutorial]”
[...] First step is to create Pivot Table. Here is a video tutorial on making pivot tables. [...]
Dear Sir,
I would like to study pivot table from basics detailed.Pls send me the tips of that
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[...] Click here to see a video tutorial of making pivot tables in excel | One more Pivot Table Video Tutorial [...]
it is very useful
hello sir
please send me some information of pivotable. and how to use it
because I am beginer so how can i learn it the pivotable.
and sir will you send me pivotable data because i have no data and i don't
know how to applyed for the pivotable. give some videos so I learn quikely.
thank you
and my best
anticipation
Hi,
This tutorail was helpful. If possible can you please email me some data, so I can create another pivot table? I am trying to learn ASAP and need some info.
Thank you
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Top of the day to you. can you pls send me a detailed tutorial on the pivot table tutorial? Thanks.
Hi,
please tell me how to use Pivot table.
@Karthick, Yemi
Have a read of: http://chandoo.org/wp/2009/08/19/excel-pivot-tables-tutorial/
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Pooja
Can you please email me information to put into a pivot table and possibly a complete set of instructions? I am a beginner to pivot tables and am possibly interested in obtaining a position that requires pivot tables. thank you.
[...] Click here to see a video tutorial of making pivot tables in excel | One more Pivot Table Video Tutorial [...]
It's simply great..!!
Cool!
Fast but not furious.
Pls email me details of pivot table. I want to learn it asap because I just got a job that requires this. Thanks
it is very useful..............thanks
Sir please can u send me the complete explanation of pivot tables from basics
hello,
I wanted to know how to put pivot with emp id, emp name, emp position in one row.
Ex:-
cel A4 should have Emp id
Cell B4 should have Emp Name
Call C4 should have Emp Position
many thanks in advance
Nice information, thanx my dear.