Excel Zone Expert Discussion, Number 11

Darn.  Was hoping ot be the first responder into the thread.  Missed again!  Must try harder in 8 weeks' time ;-)

I knew Bob had some animus toward EE, but I did not read the thread and so did not notice the personal attacks.
Do you think he even realized whom he was attacking?  Bob was not at the MVP Summit this year, but Brad,
Kevin, and I met him last year...

Patrick

PS: I used an ellipsis.  Hah!

Patrick,

Given that he used actual names rather than usernames, I'd guess he knew (but my opinion is biased). If not, he ought to have apologised after Nate pointed it out!

Rory

Kevin. So whats this practicing thingy, an ... um .. colourful variant of Her Majesty's English?

TISM

Surely should have been "are not allowed" too...

I'm surrounded by idiots...

Practicing: Actively engaged in a career or way of life; repetition of an activity for the purpose of mastering it.

i.e. yes, it's the American version of practising! :)

Bloody hell! Can't we all just get along.

Bob softened up a little in a later post "I just don't agree with charging for information that is freely available elsewhere on the web, and information that I doubt any of the responders at that site paid to obtain. But even worse, the people who do the work just get crappy points. As I said, I don't like the model."

But never backed down or acknowledged that we as well as he learned Excel the same way: a lot of practising!

Been in the MVP newsgroup recently?

Yes...anything worth looking at?

Never mind, I found the thread.

Ain't it good to be loved? ;)

Yep. I don't have any issue with people not liking the model. But when they don't like it and show a clear misunderstanding of how it actually works, then I get a little annoyed. Misconceptions such as doubting the asker can know what the correct answer is when he had to ask the question in the first place is not a very accurate depiction of what goes on here. Nor is assuming that the points are worthless and that they are misappropriated most of the time. I'm still trying to figure out why Bob perceives anyone who decides to hang out here as having learned from other real Excel experts and everyone else outside of EE learned some other more acceptable way.

The pay to get in argument works when considering that all of the existing content is essentially hidden unless you have paid. But that has nothing to do with the quality of the Experts, why we are here, and what we do on a daily basis.

I have to bite my tongue somewhat on this particular subject.
I can understand that some people might have issues with the way the site works - that's fine , and they're entitled to their opinion; but to turn that into a personal attack on people who are doing nothing different from what they do on other sites just seems bizarre to me.
Ah well, there's nowt so queer as folk, as they say!

The standout - and possibly unique - feature of the EE model is the transparent recognition of expertise. The asker awards points to the expert who solves the problem, ie it's simple, pure and recognises value  to the asker

For me, this is a better indicator of value add than forum post count, static web pages etc

My two pennorth ... :o)

Generally these other sites need you click through each answer or have a comment trail so nested it is difficult to see the wood for the trees.

I do like the EE approach which is why I started as a paying customer since I can see the development of a thread very easily.  All I can say it works for me, perhaps i'm dolly dimple - that last bit is a rhetorical question.

Chris

Barry,

Can you pls take a look at this question, here

I am frustratingly close, but not over the line on using a dynamic range name for a chart that graphs every 8th cell. I think a different approach is needed

Thx

Dave

Guys, thx for the workarounds. I should have made it clear to the OP that this was also a viable route

For my own interest though if there is a solution though for using two range names as is then I'd very much like to see it.

Cheers

Dave

I'm pretty sure you could consolidate mine into just two names, but I don't see the benefit?

Because its's there - and I didn't get to the top of that mountain :)

Well other than name length, you should just be able to replace the three other names with their definitions in the two chart names

What is the general consensus of opinion on Qs like this: http:Q_24406869.html ?

I understand the desire to award points for the attempt to help, but I can't see that having that as a PAQ adds any value at all to the knowledgebase. Just asking out of curiosity...

Rory

On the question Rory cited, it looks like a case of the Asker figuring out the answer to his real problem--you can't offset two columns to the left of column A. Had that been all, I'd have zeroed out the points and given the Asker credit for answering  it.

I do believe there was yet another mistake in logic, however, and have posted in that thread accordingly.

Brad

Can anyone make sense of this one: http:Q_24406542.html as I'm totally lost! :)

Rory

I had to look a this one twice to believe it but Barry is writing VBA now!     :-)

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Software/Office_Productivity/Office_Suites/MS_Office/Excel/Q_24406859.html

Finally - we wore him down! :)

I think "writing VBA" is perhaps overstating it. "Copying VBA out of a book" would be closer to the mark.

barry

barryhoudini said:
>>I think "writing VBA" is perhaps overstating it. "Copying VBA out of a book" would be closer to the mark.

Hey, we all have to start somewhere.

Maybe now that barry is copying VBA solutions out of books, he'll be distracted enough that maybe I can
sneak in a formula answer every once in a while :)

Well, well, well: http:Q_24416641.html#a24409798

Hmm, now if that is who I think it might be then that's quite a turn up for the books isn't it?

ProdOps
>>>I had to look a this one twice to believe it but Barry is writing VBA now!     :-)

Rorya
>>>Finally - we wore him down! :)


Barry's an old hand at code solutions (well, over at MrExcel anyway!):

http://www.mrexcel.com/forum/showthread.php?t=293751&highlight=code-monkey

:-)))

Perhaps we should call him vbarryhoudini from now on? ;)

Rorya
>>>Perhaps we should call him vbarryhoudini from now on? ;)

ROFLMAO!!!!

We had an earlier example in patrickab of someone who was quite good with formulas and user-interface type solutions--but avoided all contact with VBA. After he retired from his day job, he decided to teach himself VBA solely to help people by answering questions on Experts-Exchange. In the process of learning, he posted a number of questions on EE asking for insight into some of the darker corners of the language--and I have to admit having learned along with him by trying to answer some.

Since he may get to use VBA in his day job--and appears to possess that British tenacity in the face of difficulties--barryhoudini ought to be besting us across the board in not too many months.

RichardSchollar said:
>>Barry's an old hand at code solutions (well, over at MrExcel anyway!):
>>
>>http://www.mrexcel.com/forum/showthread.php?t=293751&highlight=code-monkey

Yeah, but that's cheating: he's just using VBA to build a formula :)

"Barry's an old hand at code solutions"

That's truer than you know, Richard

The first real work I did with Excel was about 10 years ago (perhaps more) and involved automating the conversion of some data to a different layout, with some time calculations involved. I did that with some of the old Excel 4.0 xlm macros, you just wrote them in a worksheet didn't you?

They weren't very elegant, as I recall, most of it I recorded and edited where necessary, and when we upgraded (Excel 97?) they were magically converted to VBA, and are still in use today. When required I edit them and I know enough to do whatever is required.

I will be improving my VBA skills, the difficulty for me is that I don't have the same interest in that area as I do with formulas, so I have to push myself more. I probably need a project to get stuck into.....

regards, vbarry

"Yeah, but that's cheating: he's just using VBA to build a formula :)"

Patrick, you've just summed up 99.9% of my VBA "work" (the other 0.1% is usually deleting columns)

regards, barry

vbarry,

First test - spot the deliberate syntax error...

Sub ThisThursday()
   Dim Evening As New NightOut
   Dim Pub As Location
   Dim Drink As Beverage, Round As Beverages
   For Each Round In Evening.Session
      For Each Drink In Round.Drinks
         Do Until IsEmpty(Drink.Container)
            Drink.Sip
            DoEvents
            Idle.Chatter
            Drink.Sip
         Loop
      Next Drink
   Next Round
   Exit Pub
End Sub
                                              

1:
2:
3:
4:
5:
6:
7:
8:
9:
10:
11:
12:
13:
14:
15:
16:

rorya,

Clever!  And yes, I spotted the syntax error, but it's Barry's test after all.

Just wondering what the error handler would look like for that routine... :)

Regards,

Patrick

Based on my student years:

On Error GoTo PoliceStation

:)

Rory

Doesn't Drink have to be a double?

:^P

Make that two "deliberate" mistakes...

You may have seen this, but if not...

http://www.office2010themovie.com/

Requires install of Microsoft Silverlight to watch the movie.

So who is going to give Bob a ribbing?

   http:Q_24418011.html#24413390

zorvek said:
>>So who is going to give Bob a ribbing?
>>
>>   http:Q_24418011.html#24413390

I vote for "no one", for now.  As fun as it might be for 30 seconds, if he decides to stick around, our zone would be the
better for it.  Let's see first if he will stick around, and then treat him like any other member of the club :)

Oh nuts! And I was so looking forward to it!

If we are going to take the high road, let's make sure he at least gets the points ;-)

Seems like Drink.SIP is an obvious error for this group!

I think I'm safe in this company ....

If Not Women Is Nothing Then
 
 Idle.Chatter
 
Else
 
 Profund.Conversation
 
End If
                                              

1:
2:
3:
4:
5:
6:
7:
8:
9:
10:

....... god punished my keyboard and improved my post.

Maybe we just haven't met the right woman...

It's a double standard which I'm taking this piss ut of

Women talking together is "gossiping", men catching up is "networking"

Anybody want to jump in here and demonstrate their knowledge of VBA?

regards, barry

Question about preparing to migrate macro-enabled files to Office 2007:

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Programming/Languages/Visual_Basic/VB_Objects/Q_24441508.html

A current questioner wanted to verify the mileages he is claiming for. As he lives in The Netherlands he specified that Google Maps needed to be used, as The Netherlands Revenue Service will apparently accept those results.

I came up with a method which is in the attached file. It appears that Google Maps can cope with addresses and or postcode/zipcodes in many countries. So I tried it with a variety of mixes including some for those that live in the USA. It seemed to cope with them all. You might find it useful/and or amusing - even though the code is pragmatic rather than elegant.

Patrick

ps. If someone wants to clean up my code - they are most welcome

Patrick

Patrick,

Wow, that's really cool!  Thanks for sharing that one with us :)

Regards,

Patrick

Kevin:

I just found one of your posts very helpful and clicked my first "Was this comment helpful? YES button".

http:Q_22551565.html#a19026815

That's the thing about learning.  It is a never ending journey!

Kindest Regards,

Jaes

Jaes - where have you been hiding? :)

Ah, jeez, you just found one of my many examples of blatant plagiarism.

Ya, where HAVE you been, buddy?

Kevin/Brad/Wayne,

Need your help over this question:-

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Q_24460721.html

As i don't agree with the question is been closed because all he did was a addition in the macro which i provided,Ideally he should have posted picking up things from the code which i left but no comments about that subject.

Saurabh...

Gang,

Need some help here: http://www.experts-exchange.com/Software/Office_Productivity/Office_Suites/MS_Office/Excel/Q_24472536.html

Asker wants to sort using the order defined in a custom list.  Can't get the darned thing to work :)

Regards,

Patrick

All,
Not sure if I'm enough of a "expert" to post in here but I need help.  I can't figure out the formula the asker wants in column C.

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Software/Office_Productivity/Office_Suites/MS_Office/Excel/Q_24476555.html

Thanks
Kyle

Kyle,

This is the correct place to post requests for help and you are enough of an "expert" to do so from my perspective :-)

Nice job collaborating with Patrick!

Kevin

Hi Kevin,

I've noticed that the Excel TA seems to constantly have a number of questions that have the special clock symbol by them - I suppose indicating that they've not been dealt with within a reasonable time frame. Having looked at for example the Access TA I see that they don't have any questions with the special symbol. Perhaps my snapshot of that TA was not representative.

Is it possible that we somehow receive a disproportionate number of rather unfocussed questions that are outside the Excel team's skill-set? I dunno, but I somehow find that hard to believe considering the wide knowledge and experience of many contributors.

Any thoughts on the matter.

Patrick

IMO, we get a lot of very vague questions and a large number that aren't really related to Excel, they just happen to use Excel at some point in the process. (and a few where people seem to have chosen Excel entirely at random!)

That certainly appears to be the case with quite a few. I wonder whether we should be redirecting more of them?

In point of fact as a reflection of this zone's perceived quality I have seen some posts that are nothing to do with excel as stated clearly by the poster but they include excel to get the Q noticed by the experts herein.

Chris

Is that because a large number of people use or know what Excel is whilst the number of say Access users are fewer - even though they have more questions in that TA.

Patrick

Patrick,

That icon states that the question is a Neglected Question. A Neglected Question is any question to which no one besides the Asker or an Admin has posted. When you are a Designated Expert in a zone then the Neglected Questions are tagged with that icon and are sorted to the top. Otherwise they are not tagged and appear in the list normally.

You are a Designated Expert in the Excel and Office zones but not the Access zone.

Kevin

When you answer a Neglected Question you get bonus points. I'm not sure exactly how they work but if the question is worth 500 points then you get 2,500 points for an A instead of 2,000.

Kevin

Kevin,

Thanks for that. However I realise how the system works as for a short time I signed up to it. My point was really about the fact that we seem to have quite a few Neglected Questions as an almost permanent feature and I wondered whether we can or should be redirecting more of them.

Patrick

>...but it seems to me that the easiest way to get the Neglected Questions off the list is to answer them... *grin*

No problem...wish I'd thought of that :-))

Patrick

Every zone has some number of neglected questions. They are questions that, for some reason, no one has decided to respond to. The Excel zone is among the more popular and hence always has at least 10 or 15 neglected questions. I have never seen the list with no neglected questions.

Kevin

>>> I have never seen the list with no neglected questions
    I did on Jan 1st, but it's all growed up now!

Chris

Yeah, but that was more interesting than questions about PDFCreator and OBIEE Server (which sounds like a Star Wars thing to me)... :) And there was a captive audience!

>Every zone has some number of neglected questions.

I have now looked at the Access TA on two successive days - the screenshot below tells all...and it's a busier TA than Excel

It turns out that, at this particular moment, Access does not have any neglected questions but, you wouldn't see them even if it did. You have to be a Designated Expert in that zone to see them. Otherwise they are not exposed as neglected and are sorted in the list normally. You are only a Designated Expert in Excel and Office.

Kevin

Thank you for that. Patrick

Hi guys,
How should I handle this.  

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Software/Office_Productivity/Office_Suites/MS_Office/Excel/Q_24484700.html?cid=1131#a24606827

He gave a bad grade without giving us a chance to fix our solutions.  Should I just leave him a note telling him it's good etiquette to tell us what's wrong and give us a chance to fix it before closing with a bad grade.  I've seen some people "object" but I'm not sure how to do that.

I realize this is small potatoes but for the future I'd like to know how to handle these situations.

Thanks a bunch Kyle

Kyle,

If you feel upset about the grade I would press the 'request attention' link and explain the problem there.

I received a C grade today (the only one I recall receiving)  - I can't be bothered to raise a 'request attention' issue even though I believe it would have merit.

Patrick

I don't know if it's just me, but B grades seem to me to be more and more common these days. When I first started posting here, I don't think I ever saw a grade other than A. Can't say I appreciate getting them, particularly as there's usually no reason given, but I can't be bothered to make a fuss about them anymore. I got a C once, too. Haven't bothered to read a question by that poster since... :)

>Haven't bothered to read a question by that poster since...

That's certainly my 'route of choice' now for a C grader.

Thanks guys,
I just left a note for him.  I had not noticed the Request Attention button though.  I will use it in the future if I every have an objection about something.  Thank you for the information.

Kyle

patrick,
You should raise an objection. There is no way you should get a C for this question.

http:Q_24460448.html

- Ardhendu

Ardhendu,

Thank you for your encouragement, but I've had my say in that thread, so I think I should  leave it at that.

Patrick

All,
I need help.  I was able to answer the askers question with formulas but he wants a pivot table and I can't figure it out.  Thanks

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Software/Office_Productivity/Office_Suites/MS_Office/Excel/Q_24487485.html?cid=1066#a24615145

Kyle

Hi All,
due to enormous backlog in Cleaning Up I turned the autosubscribe oof, therefore I'm not able to respond to your comments when I made some incorrect judgements. please don't take this personally. as far as I know I'm not able to re-judge questions based on specific Q's as they appear to me randomly. Looking at behaviour in the past, after a comment is made they will not be cleaned and will be tagged for further clean-up

thanks for your understanding.
score: 281 done in the last 2 days, still 442 to go.
Regards,
Jeroen

Jeroen,

I have been watching the progress of your significant efforts. Don't worry about not getting any feedback. It will sort itself out in due course. As far as I'm concerned all's OK with me.

Patrick

Jeroen,

thx again for all your efforts, much appreciated

Regards

Dave

Have to stop now, made recommendations for about 450 Q's, I know there are a few Q's open. Only my mouse needs some juice. (battery is very low). have to continue later on.
Good luck to you all. Sometimes I'm missing those days/nights working/playing with you together. Only lacking in time, which will prevent me gaining the 2M in excel zone. At least I'm still in the top 10 Overall for as long as it takes and it is worth :)

Now I really quit. There seems no ending on abandoned questions, in the statistics there were about 723 abandonded Q's I made recommendations for about 757 of them, and still no end. At least it kept me from reading a good book (or 2), watching about 5 movies, cleaning my car+ the neighbours cars and anyone who just passed by.

So there you have my 10 hours of contribution for this year. I know I probably made some mis judgements, let's hope you all get what you deserve, and if not, sorry for that. It will take some time I will have a similar action like this so be patient.
Somehow it was fun to do this, I noticed the quality of answers has rissen from the known people, and I also noticed some "for-me-newbies" who made excellent jobs.
Some additional notes:
- Dave good to see you back,
- Jaes, I certainly liked the old name better
- Harry, I wished we met in some Q's, only I didn't had the time, I already heard about you and now I saw it
- Brad, Rory, Kevin, Wayne, Patrick and PatrickM :): I'm glad you are able to pick up the excel 2007 Q's, I'm keeping sticked to the old 2003. (so I'm really getting old) I already thought about setting up a petition at work to get rid of the new version so I will be able to continue lecturing excel to colleagues, there I'm also getting old.
@All: Have fun and read you next time
Jeroen

What a fantastic effort Jeroen. 450 questions that's a huge effort by you. Congratulations on processing so many.
Patrick

Hello Jeroen

Harry?! I assume that's me? Thanks for your time and effort, much appreciated

regards, barry

Jeroen,

As someone who used to do Cleanup in this zone, I truly understand and appreciate how difficult it can be,
and I applaud your efforts.  Thank you!

FWIW, I still do about 98% of my work in Excel 2003.  It's my employers standard, and I only ever use
Excel 2007 when I need >65536 rows but do not want to use Access, I am answering EE questions, or
I am testing an old bit of code on the newer version :)

Still can't get used to the damn ribbon, although I confess that if I were brand new to Office I might prefer
it to the menu :)

Regards,

Patrick

I'm glad to hear Jeroen say the quality of answers has improved. That's an observation that can best be made by someone who drops in every now and then, and then makes a detailed study of our efforts. You really can't do it if you are answering questions every day.

It's the quality of our efforts that makes Askers want to keep coming back to EE for help. The site benefits because a certain portion of those Askers are paying members. And the newer experts benefit because they start imitating the care taken by the more experienced experts to support the Askers--and accelerate their learning in the process.

Brad

Jeroen,

I just logged on and found pages of emails from you.  Fantastic work and much appreciated.  

Thanks,
Jerry

Hi guys, sorry I'm really late to this party. I've had a few things going on, including starting a new blog (per Microsoft's request), and as you see, dealing with a few different issues.

I'm really sorry about that, and hopefully my response was on-target, I was not happy to see that, at all - in terms of randomly picked names of friends (imo).

There's a different issue at Ozgrid, and it's not that I'm a US MVP (I'm actually Canadian by birthright), it's that the site changed my status to "Spammer" - which isn't that cool. Otherwise, well, I'll leave it at that.

I gave EE good remarks for the most part on my recent blog entry, I do like this site. And if problems ever crop up at MrExcel.com, be sure to ping Richard, Barry, Rory, Bill or myself, etc... And we will handle them. What I saw was innapropriate.

Best.
Nate

"Bob was not at the MVP Summit this year, but Brad, Kevin, and I met him last year..."

We all did - and unless you're willing to say something like that to someone's face, you probably shouldn't say anything at all. At least when Kevin laughs at my balderdash, he does it to my face! Plus it cracks me up!

I feel bad about that, it's not a great reflection on the person making making the comments, nor the site. I got rid of most of the personal nonsense as soon as I saw it - and am willing to further purge, if needed. There's no need for that kind of review.

:-)

I think at this point Bob has gotten that he was a wee bit out of line and a wee bit in the minority. On the positive side he elicited a considerable amount of camaraderie and support for all of us who toil without reward to help the poor sods who find themselves at the mercy of Excel's myriad of complexities and nuances...and bugs, and without regard to what website we happen to consider home.

>At least when Kevin laughs at my balderdash, he does it to my face! Plus it cracks me up!

Likewise, bud!

Kevin

Barry, indeed, has to be Barry instead of Harry, (sorry)  through all the questions I keep the remembering you as the original Harry Houdini, only you are using formulas to build up your chain of solutions :)

Jeoren,

Appreciate your hard work buddy and i know it's not easy, Just logged into my personal email linked to EE and i had close to 200 emails unread all from EE for questions you left comment on and going by your recommendation i didn't found that you missed out something anywhere, So i would say good job buddy...Keep it up and keep it coming... :-)

Saurabh....

Nate,

How about a link to your blog?  :)

Melissa asked me to start blogging too.  Now I have to come up with something interesting to write about.
It's so much easier to just answer a question :)

Patrick

Patrick (and all),

http://msmvps.com/blogs/nateoliver/default.aspx :) Dick Kusleika linked to it on ddoe a couple weeks back

Hope all is well with everyone

Heya Matt, how are you doing? :)

>For me, this is a better indicator of value add than forum post count, static web pages etc

I agree with you on post count, it can be useless. The person with the largest post count at MrExcel.com also has the largest amount of non-functional posts there, weird follow-up questions, like "what do you mean?"

Static web pages, can be measured to some extent in value-add. E.g., Talking with Chip Pearson, at length, on a bus ride from Redmond to Seattle, he mentioned his website gets 18,000 page-views per day. That strikes me as fairly insane/impressive, for static content. J-Walk gets about 6,000 per day, or so he guessed.

Sorry I didn't provide a link to my new blog, I didn't want my post, here, which was meant to be an apology, to come off as spammy - not that there's any ads or stuff for sale at my blog. Not sure who's reading this thing, but I had 1,200 page views in a single day, the other day.

Which makes me wonder if I need to change my approach...

Oh, and if you do stop by my blog, a word of caution on arguing with fzz - me thinks that's Harlan Grove.

Nate,

I found that IRR vs CAGR dust-up to be hilarious.  I even have a QuickEE macro to post a standard screed
against IRR.  (Not the function, mind you, or its cousins MIRR or XIRR.  Rather, the whole concept is
dangerous, and best avoided, for reasons you articulate well in your replies to fzz.)

Regards,

Patrick

Thanks, Patrick!

I find that if you want to respond to fzz, you either want to do it in an inquisitive manner, or use extreme sarcasm, and you want to be right if you do the latter. Buyer beware, the latter is akin to riding a bucking bronco.

In terms of you starting a blog, a few thoughts. As an MVP, you get free blog=space if you want, at the same site I'm blogging at. Hit me up offline, and I'll set you up with the Admin (you know my addy). And while it might be easier to answer a question, how many questions have you answered over the years? That's your content.

You just want to write about issues that people are asking about, want to understand, and you can help. With my having over 20,000 posts over the years and having read an insane amount of Excel-related content, it provides a decent working base for content ideas.

> I found that IRR vs CAGR dust-up to be hilarious.

Patrick, should I dare to look?   :)

I like your little spiel btw, mine is similar  here

I have been inspired to propsose a new set of  question guidelines. It even spells practice correctly......

Please do not under any circumstances supply your sample file, or provide a detailed explanation of what you need. This would greatly reduce the time needed to solve your question, and would only free up our experts to get on with their day jobs, answer other questions or in Saurabh's case sleep.

If you persist in being difficult, please ensure that you provide only pictures of your spreadsheet, never the actual Excel file that you are working on. Otherwise our experts will not have the joy of re-creating that which is already built - how else would we get our kicks?

It is essential that you never, repeat never, specify

• The version of Excel you are using,  
• whether formulas or VBA are a must,  
• whether you really wanted Vbscript rather than VBA  
• if you are using a Mac.  

Having followed these steps, it is then considered good form not to revisit your initial question (and if it's been solved why bother?)  until the clean-up process begins. At which point you should propose closing the question and awarding the points to yourself as you "found the answer somewhere else".

Congratulations! You have just achieved asker best practice

:) Feeling a little cynical tonight, Dave?

You forgot to mention not worrying about whether your question actually has anything to do with Excel at all, but otherwise it looks spot on! :)

>Congratulations! You have just achieved asker best practice

Excellent supplementary guidelines Dave.

Lol :)

I'm a convert to this ee-mobile angle Rory, it actually is both speedy and very presentable. Code would be a different kettle of fish ...

...and you don't even need a mobile device!

Lol@ Dave, that's a good one but at the moment i'm cutting down my time i spent on EE because i found out that out of 24 hours, 20 hours i'm here and 4 hours i'm sleeping, Plus i'm switiching my job moving into a new one which is also going to take my time so you see you will see less of me here...

Saurabh...

Saurabh,

Thank goodness - that'll leave us some questions to answer!

Good luck with the new job.

Patrick

Lol@ Patrick, Sure but i guess i'm addicted to this site so i doubt whether i will be able to stay away from here or not.

Thanks for your wishes.

Saurabh...

I sent this to EE a few months ago after netminder recommended an aptitude test for new members (http://www.testprepreview.com/wonderlicpracticequestions1.htm).

---

Intelligence is certainly one factor of a member's potential success at Experts Exchange. Another dimension is personality or the ability to get along with others. We have certainly seen some members with issues in this area and they have been a source of angst for other members as well as representing a lot of labor for the moderators and admins. So I want to augment netminder's comments with the following.

In addition to the proposed aptitude evaluation, I would like to consider a personality aspect to this screening process. Something like:

"When I first meet a person I assume they are a) an asshole, b) an idiot, or c) someone I don't know."

"When someone offers me advice my assumption is that they are a) an asshole, b) an idiot, or c) someone with an opinion and/or experience."

If they answer (c) in both cases then they can proceed to the aptitude section.

If they answer (a) or (b) in either case then we have a choice...one possible path is to give them information about the moderator and admin roles and how to apply for those positions.

Kevin

Hello everyone.  Can I get some help with this one please:)  Thanks

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Software/Office_Productivity/Office_Suites/MS_Office/Excel/Q_24524096.html#a24718267

Kyle

Kyle,

I've posted a solution - whether it's what's wanted I dunno, I'll wait and see.

Patrick

Thanks Patrick,
Good idea.  I should have posted a VBA alternative but for some reason I had it stuck in my mind that he only wanted formulas.  You're help is much appreciated.

Kyle

Hi folks,

Any further offers on my question:

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Software/Office_Productivity/Office_Suites/MS_Office/Excel/Q_24528681.html?cid=239#a24732770

Patrick

Guys,

I became MVP in Excel w.e.f 1st July, I got the email for the same.

Thanks Patrick and Kevin for all your help.

Saurabh...

Congratulations! :)

Thanks rory.

Congrats S :)

Thanks Dave

And im sure i wont have manage it without help of you guys, learnt lot of things from you. :-)

Saurabh.

Congratulations Saurabh!

You don't seem to have posted your bio sketch and picture up on the MVP web site. https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/communities/mvp.aspx That's how we learn about all the new MVPs, so please share the good news at your earliest convenience.

I also hope you will attend the Summit meeting next Spring. I'd like to shake your hand and thank you for the thousands of hours you've put into answering questions here on Experts-Exchange.

Brad

Hi Brad,

Thanks for all your wishes and i believe the summit happens differently for we guys as i was having a look over it, Also i need to provide my details and photo since these guys asked for it, will do that tomorrow or sometime later.

Again thanks a lot for your wishes and infact i have loved working with you guys as learnt a lot from your guys.

Saurabh....

<<Saurabh posted a brief bio at https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile=73038AD3-9D29-427E-9C6A-871CC7D14B56  The picture is yet to come. >>

byundt--7/1/09

Have any other new MVPs heard back from Microsoft, or "old" MVPs received their renewals?

excite.com's mail server is down, so my reaward notice is probably just sitting there... :)

BTW, just noticed today that barry is only ~25k away from his Genius cert.  That has to make him the
fastest ever to get to Genius in Excel, right?

I see bio sketches on the MVP site for you, Kevin, Jim Everist, Richard Schollar, Nate Oliver and Rory. Matt's sketch was missing. If Microsoft prunes the sketches for people who were not reawarded, then the Excel regulars had a pretty good day!

Brad

Yeah, I was notified ahead of time that I would not be renewed. Not a surprise in the least, as I've been basically absent the past year. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the future, when I start back up. Assuming I don't ever get reawarded I'm still quite proud I ever was :)

Matt

Matt,
You've certainly had your share of major life-changing events in the past year. Those can make it very difficult to find the time to make the quality posts you were famous for.

I look forward to your starting back up, and wish you good luck in your future endeavors.

Brad

Things will slow down, and I will be back. 3 days til I'm married, so you can imagine how hectic it is right now!

I made it for another year. Whew!

Saurabh,

Just back from the pub in London where I heard in person from Richard Schollar and Rory of your award. Congratulations, it's well deserved!

regards, barry

Thanks a lot barry for your wishes :-)

Saurabh

> Things will slow down, and I will be back. 3 days til I'm married, so you can imagine how hectic it is right now

Best wishes Matt for the big day :)

mvidas said:
>>Things will slow down, and I will be back. 3 days til I'm married, so you can imagine how hectic it is right now!

Best of luck Matt as you start on a new phase of your life!

Thanks guys :)

Dave, I sent you an email a couple weeks back on gmail, now I'm wondering if you actually use that address!

> Dave, I sent you an email a couple weeks back on gmail, now I'm wondering if you actually use that address!

Nope. Nor my problematic vbaexpress one

I will retrieve it and then send you my current addresses

All,

Check your copy of the just-released EE Newsletter, which has the Q2 awards round-up.  The Excel zone
made a very good account of itself, placing three members in the top 10 site wide for the quarter.

One stat that amazed me:

Saurabh's Excel points for the quarter: 746,050
Saurabh's Total points for the quarter: 752,050
Saurabh's points having nothing to do with Excel: 6,000

I guess our buddy has a laser-like focus on Excel questions :)

Cheers,

Patrick

That's pretty impressive - it's almost impossible these days not to score points in zones you've never even heard of, as far as I can tell! :)

Hey guys, where'ss the cavalry
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=30199100&postID=3138930701340108608&page=1

I found these rather deflating comments on EE when my upgraded Firefox broswer - which I highly recommend - someone listed user feedack on EE via WOT ratings. At the least it's fair to say that EE has an impact, people either love it or loathe it.

One damning link led to this anti- EE blog by a Security MVP. I jotted a quick response, which to be fair to the site owner, he was prepared to post.

Dave,

I saw your comment on the blog, and I commend your effort, but I have a feeling that there is nothing you
could say that will change that blogger's mind :)

Regards,

Patrick

A mass WOT vote? :)

Its interesting. This reaction (to the overall model, not Excel TA specifically) is similar to the sort of reaction that OzGrid gets from a number of the old school Excel MVPs.

Hey Patrick,

You got me there buddy, I'm just focussing on excel zone only because i dont want to end up like jack of all trades and master of none and Yes just closely beated you and rory for the overall points.

And now days its dave which is back and active like anything, Its difficult to keep pace with him.

Saurabh

As far as I can tell, there are quite a few MVPs that hate this place, including of course some that post here anyway. Doesn't seem to be much point in arguing with them.

Oh, and it was great to see Richard finally acknowledged as a Rookie in the newsletter! :)

My assesment is these guys dont like the attention EE gets everywhere because it's famous like anything.

> As far as I can tell, there are quite a few MVPs that hate this place, including of course some that post here anyway.

I don't hold it against you Rory :)

Congrats Richard :)

I'm battling my addiction! :)

(I'm assuming we can all guess who I meant)

>Hey guys, where'ss the cavalry
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=30199100&postID=3138930701340108608&page=1

I have posted my 2 pennyworth on that blog - we'll see whether they can stomach the tone of my comments.

Dave,

After reading your comments and Corrine's response the following words by Mark Twain came into my mind -

~ Never argue with a fool, onlookers may not be able to tell the difference. ~

It looks like she is hell-bent on dishing it out on Experts-exchange and no amount of reasonable comments will ever change her mind.

At the end, it makes a pretty good laugh reading her comments and some of the other comments posted.

- Ardhendu

There is a rather lively discussion in the private MVP newsgroup that started with my posting an offer for a free EE membership in 3rd party offers. So far the posts are about 1/3 in favor and 2/3 against EE. It's very civilized...so far. I encourage the MVPs here to make their statements.

Kevin

> ~ Never argue with a fool, onlookers may not be able to tell the difference. ~

very true Pari

I posted more out of bemusement than anything else. I learnt a long time ago that internet debates are useless ...... eventuually someone eventually resorts to saying "you can't even spell" :)

> But I wouldn't bother trying to teach a pig now to sing; it wastes your time and annoys the pig.

I like that Eric .....  I'm appropriating  it for future use.

Even though a pig can't learn to sing it seems that a few of us have still attempted to teach it to do so.

Patrick

Yeah, but at least I can walk away from the smell.

Guys, Does anyone has experties on AS400 , I need help over the following question:-

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Q__24575748.html

Patrick .... as long as you don't have any flu symptoms

Not yet - it's only a matter of time... It's predicted that 30% of the UK population will contract swine 'flu. If only 1 in a 1000 die from it, that's over 200,000 deaths. Great if you're in the funeral parlour business but for the rest of us...

ps. What's been glossed over by most is that swine 'flu has been contracted, on and off, by USA pig farmers for a long time. In other words it's nothing new.

There's a supposed "outbreak" here in Australia, but so far the deaths have been limited to those who have underlying health issues. There's probably been just as many deaths in people who had the normal flu, but that wouldn't sell any papers, so it's not reported...

By the sounds of it, Australia is only a little behind the UK on the curve. We were at that stage about a month ago and we were about a month or so behind the USA. So I'm afraid it'll develop in Australia - just a matter of time.

I have to say I'm a little suspicious of the "underlying health issues".

It's certainly avoided mass panic - rightly so as this flu version seems no more deadly than normal - but I do wonder about the reality of the situation.

I'm not sure Australia is "behind" the UK. As I write both UK and Australia have the same number of deaths (29), but, of course, Australia is only 1/3 the size (in population terms) of the UK.

I suppose you'd expect the spread to be greater in Oz. As it's winter there and summer here.....

In India we just got 6 Cases so far and no death's as of right now, It's hard to spread here because of the climate since our country is hot and swine flu don't carry in hot tempratures.

>It's hard to spread here because of the climate since our country is hot and swine flu don't carry in hot tempratures.

Don't kid yourself - it will spread, even in India.

I'm not. I'm sure it will spread out here as well but chances for it are not as much great as like in other countires.

>I'm sure it will spread out here as well but chances for it are not as much great as like in other countires.

Not sure what you base that theory on. It's as hot or even hotter in Mexico than in India. And the outbreak on a large scale started in Mexico. The southern most part of Mexico is south of Hyderabad so I somehow doubt your theory stands up! Perhaps your politicians are trying to calm the masses by telling everyone that the climate is against the spread of swine 'flu. I'm afraid the climate will do nothing to prevent the spread of the virus. Perhaps the Arctic and Antarctic might escape but even that is not guaranteed when you consider that the Inuit suffered from germs imported by arctic explorers.

Hmm.. Ahh i see what you meant, But i have read it somewhere not sure where and thats why was saying climate plays an important role, Also my numbers about the swine flu infection is outdated, Its not as of date. Just found out that google shut down his office in hyderabad for 2 days because of swine flu.

I fear that none of us is beyond it's reaches. If it reaches truly epidemic proportions - like 30% of the population - it will be disastrous. Tammiflu will help many but there probably won't be enough to go round.

Gang,

Let's not let this milestone go unnoticed, shall we?  :)

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Software/Office_Productivity/Office_Suites/MS_Office/Excel/Q_24555041.html

(And thank you Thomas for remembering to set it up!)

Patrick

Kyle, nice post over at Ms Chorney's blog

She does seem very well balanced - a chip on each shoulder. :)

@saurabh726: "In India we just got 6 Cases so far and no death's as of right now"
According to flutracker there are already 107 confirmed cases of which 1 deceased.
http://flutracker.rhizalabs.com/
Relative it is quite a small number.

I believe we shouldn't bother with that blog. Anyone who needs to read a blog to assess whether a website is worth using has nothing better to do with their lives.

Heaven forbid that they would actually try it sensibly themselves. That would be pushing the boundaries of common sense and intelligence just a little too far for those folk.

The pig doesn't seem in the least bit annoyed, certainly hasn't learnt to sing and is like most pigs, pig ignorant.

@Roos,

I realised that my numbers were outdated since i have been keeping myself busy in lot of things and didnt got time to update myself. Thanks for the update and yes i agree compartively its very small number.

new thread? :)