Category Archives for Data Visualizations
Excel Data Visualization: Presidential Approval Ratings with Slicers & Power Query – Chart Tricks
No matter where you fall on the political spectrum, you’ll love the chart I’ve created, which you can adapt and use in your own work. The instructions are a bit complicated, so rather than go through every element with figures, I’ve written up what I would do assuming you’re watching and following along in the […]
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Three Common Dashboard Mistakes
I recently contributed to the article on MRC’s Cup of Joe Blog called 7 harmful business dashboard mistakes. I’ll excerpt a version of what I said below, but you should follow the link to read the whole thing. (I’ll use the original version I sent to blog so as not to compete for search keys.) I’ll […]
Continue readingAuto highlighting Excel charts
On your dashboards, reports, and charts it’s a good idea to alert the user to certain types of values. In a recent post, we discussed how to alert users to certain records on tables using custom formats. We’ll build upon that here but transition to how we might achieve a similar effect on a chart. Take […]
Continue readingCustom Formats for Dashboards and Spreadsheet Applications
Conditional formats are volatile. If you have too many, you see the effects of this volatility in serious calculations slowdown. As the function guru Charles Williams puts it, “…conditional formats seem to be super-volatile: they are evaluated each time the cell that contains them is repainted on the screen, even in Manual calculation mode….” But […]
Continue readingExcel Bug in Office 365
I’ve found a rather obnoxious bug in the version of Excel 2013 that comes with Office 365. As you know, I’m a big fan of doing stuff with charts. One of my favorite things is to make a dynamic series that disappears based on some user functionality like in the animation below. So far so […]
Continue readingA Dynamically Linked Checkbox Matrix with Microsoft Excel
Edit: sorry for some of the squashed images you see in this and other posts. I’m still working on my layout. In the meantime, click on an image to view it in full if you’re having trouble. Today, I want to show you what I liked to call a “ dynamically linked matrix.” I’ll post […]
Continue readingAnother way to do bullet graphs in Excel
Those of you who know me, know I’m a huge fan of Stephen Few. (I mean, I had him autograph my copy of Information Dashboard Design!) Few is highly regarded as an expert on data visualization and dashboard design. He is the original designer of bullet graphs. Bullet graphs are not native to Excel’s chart […]
Continue readingBook Updates
I figured I’d break hibernation to give everyone a small, quick update on the book. According to the original dates agreed upon in my contract with Apress, I should be close to finishing my book by now. Well, internet, I’m not close at all. I still have a lot more work ahead of me. The […]
Continue readingAre You Series(ous)?
Do you work with different series in your Excel charts? Here is what I would like the final chart to loo like. Note the white dashed lines in front of the columns: Setup: I started with the chart I ended with in my last post, Points Of Interest. I then added some data to a separate […]
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Hello World! (Sorry, I could not resist J) I was recently asked by our host, Jordan, if I would be interested in being a guest author here at Option Explicit VBA. I quickly and humbly accepted. I will strive to do my best to add something of value. Let’s dive right in.I was inspired the […]
Continue readingInteractive United States 2012 Presidential Scoreboard in Excel
Alright, here’s another map-based rollover. The instructions are pretty simple: click on a state to toggle through its party selection. Click on one of the three selections above to change scenarios. In the next month or so, I’ll be putting together a tutorial on this. But in the meantime, have some fun. Download. Ask questions […]
Continue readingInteractive Map in Excel using Rollovers
Alright, so this seemed like the next logical step for the rollover method: This one is kinda complicated, I admit. Unfortunately, I didn’t really take the time to clean up the spreadsheet file for others to follow (I don’t really have the time these days). Sorry. But try to take it apart – and ask […]
Continue readingHow to: highlighting cells using the rollover technique in Excel
In my last post I used my patented rollover technique to create an effect similar to the one shown below: Neat, huh? When you place your mouse over a cell, it changes color to show that you are selecting it. It’s a true “rollover”: no mouse-clicks required. In my last post, I show how that might […]
Continue readingMiscellaneous Stuff
First, a big thank you to everyone following my blog. Here’s some stuff I’d like to share in no particular order. Stephen Colbert Come to My Wedding We (my fiance and I) want Stephen Colbert to come to our wedding, which is in October of this year. My beautiful and wonderful fiance explains as follows: During the […]
Continue readingVisualizing.org: Garbage In, Garbage Out
There are a lot of awful visualizations and info graphics floating around the internet. I’ve sent some of the worst I’ve found to my new internet friend, Kaiser Fung, at JunkCharts. His blog hosts a formidable, if unfortunate, collection of chartjunk and he attempts both to make sense of them as well as to provide suggestions on how to make them better. […]
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