Excel Ticker

Dynamic Excel chart with dynamic title based on cell selection

Roberto Mensa — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 12:42:40 +0000

This following post is a guest post and was written by Roberto Mensa, Krisztina Szabó and Gábor Madács. Thanks Roberto, Krisztina and Gábor

A few days ago we were working with the CELL formula to draw your attention to use the English info_type attribute if you share your Excel file with someone how uses Excel with different language setting. The second argument of this formula is the reference, which is optional. If it is omitted, the information is returned for the last cell that was changed, as we can read in the Excel Help.

It is important to make it clear that “last cell that was changed” relates to the calculation. Change means a kind of change that triggers calculation. So if you manually re-calculate your sheet, the “last cell” will be the active cell where your cursor is positioned. My Hungarian friend Krisztina Szabó gave me an idea to build a dynamic chart based on the active cell. So we made a challenging example. In this article, we would like to show you how you can build up a similar solution based on our tricks. We have provided a sample file, which you can download at the end of this article.

Here we need to mention that there are some formula name “spelling” issues in case you assign the names to chart objects via the formula bar. Please read the note at the end of this article about the details.

Example – Quarterly sales by vendors

As an example we use a table with quarterly sales data of 9 vendors. Create a simple chart for Vendor_1 as you see below. You can delete the legend, we will not need it now. We will simply change the chart using some names and named formulas to make it dynamic. It will be a row-based dynamic chart to show vendor sales by quarters.

Creating support formulas

First of all you need to name your input data table. We will use the name: Input_area only for the data part, without including row and column headers. You can set it directly on the worksheet by selecting the range from B2 to E10 and typing the name “Input_area” to the Name Box, as you see on the picture below, or you can choose the Name Manager and create a New Name.

We are building a row-based dynamic chart, so we need to determine the active row within the Input_area table. First we determine the number of this row, after it we will index the data table to read the data from this row – this data will be used in our chart.

The CELL function with “row” argument but without second argument will give us the number of the actual row, the row of the active cell. If this row is outside of the Input_area, we need to modify it: in this case we will use the first or the last row of the table. For this purpose we use the MEDIAN function with 3 arguments:

row number of the active cell: CELL(“row”)
first row of the data table: CELL(“row” , Input_area)
here we use the CELL function with Input_area range as second argument. CELL will return information only about the upper left cell of Input_area – so we have the row number of the first row.
last row of the data table: MAX(ROW(Input_area))
here we take adventage of the special feature of named formulas that they are array formulas. ROW – as array formula – will give us an array containing all the row numbers within Input_area. With MAX we choose the highest number, which is the last row – and that is exactly what we need.

MEDIAN will return the number in the middle of the given 3 arguments – this row is within the data table. You need to use the Name Manager to create the new name “ActiveCellRow” referring to the formula:

=MEDIAN( CELL("row"),
 CELL("row" , Input_area),
 MAX(ROW(Input_area)))

And now we can index the Input_area to have data from the active row. Create a new name: ActiveRowData referring to formula:

=INDEX (Input_area,
 ActiveCellRow-CELL("row" , Input_area)+1 , 0)

Assign data to chart series

Right click on the chart area – choose Select Data. You have only one data series: Vendor_1. Select it and click Edit. Update Series Values to ActiveRowData, as you see on the below screenshot. If you need dynamic Legend, you can change the formula in the Series name field.

Or you can change the 3rd parameter of the SERIES formula directly on the formula bar:

=SERIES(Sheet1!$A$2,
 Sheet1!$B$1:$E$1,
 Sheet1!ActiveRowData , 1)

And now you can try: when you change the selection, and run a calculation (F9) your chart will be refreshed!

Dynamic chart title

The only problem is that the title of the chart is static. In the next steps we will make it dynamic, based on the active cell. First you need a name with reference to a single cell. You can simply name one of the Vendor cells on your worksheet. Let’s choose A2 and create the name: ActiveTitle.

We put this name into the chart title using the formula bar. Select the chart title and click on the formula bar. You can choose which method is the most convenient for you:

Simply enter the formula with sheet name: =Sheet1!ActiveTitle
or after typing the equal sign you can click somewhere on the worksheet and delete back the cell reference, replacing with ActiveTitle.

You can see that Excel replaces your sheet name with the file name if you use a workbook-scoped name. It is normal. Naturally you can enter the name in this format too, but usually it is more convenient to use the sheet name and let Excel change it.

The last step is to change the name to be dynamic. We can use OFFSET formula to determine the vendor name, because it’s on the left of Input_area. ActiveRowData is the range we want to offset. We are in the active row, so we omit the second parameter. Step one cell left, so the 3rd parameter is -1. And we need only one cell, so obviously the last two parameters are 1. Concatenate a text with the formula to make it clear what we see on the chart:

=”Quarterly sales of “ &
  OFFSET(ActiveRowData ,,-1,1,1)

Go to the Name Manager and choose the existing ActiveTitle – click on Edit and write the formula into the Refers to box as you can see on the picture below:

If you check the formula bar of the title now, you can see that Excel put the reference between quotation marks:

=”Dynamic_chart_base.xlsm!ActiveTitle”

Automated calculation for selection change

Now it is finished! The chart series and the title is dynamic, based on the active cell! Each time you move the active cell, followed by a recalculation (F9), the chart will be updated. In order to avoid having to press F9 you can add a simple event procedure that will re-calculate the sheet when the selection changes.

Open the VBA editor (Alt+F11) and write “Target.Parent.Calculate” into the Worksheet_SelectionChange event sub of your worksheet.

Please remember, in this case you must save the workbook as Excel Macro-Enabled Workbook – as .xlsm format, and enable macros when you open the file.

Conclusion

While you read the section about dynamic chart title, you may ask why we create a name with range reference first? Why not create the name for the offset function and assign it to the chart title in one simple step? The answer is very simple: it is not possible. Excel does not accept a name as chart title when this name is not a reference. It can be cell reference as it was when created ActiveTitle first, and can be a formula which gives back reference – for example offset. BUT if you, for example, concatenate it with a string or other cell value, it will be refused.

The only way to use this non-reference kind of name as chart title is to create a name first with reference and add to chart title in the formula bar. After it you can modify the Refers to parameter of the name to a formula as you wish.

Important notes

We have made lot of tests and experienced some problems with names beginning with the letters “c” or “r” – as column and row. For example: rng_mydata, Range1, chart_1, ChartTitle. In your local language Excel, not only these two letters, but your local column and row letters can be problematic as first letter of a name. When you want to use these names on the chart formula bar in the SERIES formula, Excel will not accept them. If you want to use them, you can only change the series in the Edit Series window. Excel also will not accept the names entered on the formula bar for Chart Titles. If you want to use them, the only possibility is to assign them in VBA.

Finally the download link for the sample file and a link to Robertos Blog.

Microsoft FUSE Labs social network so.cl

Mourad Louha — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 17:39:59 +0000

As a fan of the ideas and tools of Microsoft FUSE Labs, I registered for an e-mail invitation to participate in the beta test for the new social network so.cl some time ago. Although I had not recieved an invitation, I was fortunately able to take a closer look to the platform two days ago, as I got an invitation from a friend via Facebook.

In order to use the social network, you have to log in by using a Facebook account. Then you will be taken to the welcome page, where the main functions and features are well explained.

Firstly, the layout reminded me the layout from Google+. But once interacting with the surface, I discovered many interesting and significant features that are not available in other social networks.

Unlike as on other platforms, the input boxes for searching and posting are not separated into two input fields but share the same input field. The selection which type of task has to be performed is done by clicking on one of the icons at the right side of the input field. The seach function is set as default; may be because FUSE Labs (had?) defined students as the primary target user group.

After a search is launched by entering the search terms and clicking on the “Search” button, the application switches to a corresponding view and lists both found text links and images. The „Everything“ filter option for the search results is then also automatically selected.

More filters allow to refine the search results and it is possible to define tags for the search results. The user defined tags are then listed on the left side, under the section “Tags”.

However, the most interesting feature here, is the implementation for sharing the seach results. The search can be published as a post on so.cl. And selected search result items can be attached to this post. It is also possible to change your search terms, perform a new search and then attach the new results to your post.

For writing posts to so.cl, you may click click on the comment icon right to the input field, enter your message and click on “Post”. A very nice feature is the possibility to change your privacy settings (arrow in the following screenshot) from “Public” to “Private” by just one click on the icon right to the input field.

Links in posts will be usually shortened. I noticed a small bug here: if a link is followed by one or more line breaks (for example when appending line breaks to a link in a text editor, copy and paste the content of the text editor to the input field), then the text
is appended to the shortened link and therefore does not work. By the way, if a bug is recognized by the application, you are redirected to special page with a nice beetle. If you find a bug, you can also report it to the FUSE Labs forum.

Like the search functions, the Feed can be filtered on a basis of predefined options. There are currently four options “Everyone”, “People I follow”, “My conversations” and “Me” available. I really like the option “My conversations”, which gives a quick overview of the posts in which I was involved.

And the same structure has been chosen for displaying the own activites; this can be done by clicking on your name on the upper rigth corner.

A useful feature is the possibility to edit own posts; for example to correct typing errors. Posts can be shared on Facebook or you can retrieve a link to your post. Please note, if you share a post from so.cl to Facebook and you then delete the post on so.cl, that the shared post on Facebook is not deleted.

An interesting feature is the possibility to include a post and its comments on your website by copying and pasting the embed code from so.cl to your webpage. This currently works for all public posts on so.cl. The embed code includes an i-frame which accesses the post on so.cl.

The last feature I would like to present, are the “video parties”, which allow to share and watch videos at the same time with other users. I tried it out with the flying penguins

By the way, your personal settings (for example for setup your e-mail notifications) can be reached on so.cl by clicking on your avatar right to your name and then select “Settings”.

My personal conclusion of this, surely, first impression: I like the currently implemented features; especially the search possibilities and that only a few clicks are necessary to get what you want. I am very curious about new features coming next year (hope so). Finally, I embedded a post from so.cl and at the end of this article listed some links.

Embedding an Excel file from SkyDrive on your website and mash it up by using JavaScript

Mourad Louha — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 16:02:47 +0000

If you are using SkyDrive for storing your Office documents, you have probably already discovered the features for sharing your files with other people. And perhaps you have also read on some blogs how to embed an Excel file to your website. Recently, the Excel Team has created the possibility to interact with an embedded Excel file by using JavaScript.

In this blog post, I will describe how to embed and interact with an Excel file from SkyDrive. For this, I uploaded a web app compatible version of my workbook for my Excel formula translations and then I implemented some JavaScript Code to change values in the embedded file.

The workbook includes five worksheets: “Info” just includes some info’s about me, “Formulas” lists the formulas in the different languages, “Compare” can be used for comparing the formulas in two languages, “Languages” includes the list of available languages and “Resources” allows to select between the three languages German, English and French for the interface of the workbook. My goal was now to allow to the user to select the two languages for comparing the formulas and to switch from one interface language to another.

Learn and explore

Microsoft has recently launched the website “Excel Mashup”, where in addition to learning materials and tutorials you will also find some very interesting code samples. The site also lists the most important links to the MSDN documentation about the JavaScript object model, methods and properties for the Excel Services.

You can get started creating your first mash-up by going to the section “Get Started” and follow the three steps. The third step “Mash it up!” explains a sample application connecting Bing Maps to an Excel file. However, because the code in this sample may be a little bit complex for a beginner, I recommend to switch to the “Explore” section where you can reach a page offering three choices.

The first possibility “How to” leads to an article from MSDN explaining the basics how to include the JavaScript code on your webpage. The second possibility “Interactive Code Snippets” lets you explore and interactively modify some sample code snippets.

As I needed to change some cell values on my sheets for changing a language, I had a closer look on “Set specific cell to value”, which seemed to be most suitable for my goal.

Developing the sample application

For embedding an Excel file to your webpage after you have uploaded the file to SkyDrive, you can select the menu “Share – Embed” to open the assistant. The dialogue offers two different methods how the file should be embedded and allows to set some interactivity and display options.

The most important option for ensuring the programmatic interactivity of the Excel workbook is to select “JavaScript” when creating the Embed code. This code may be copied from the textbox and be taken as the starting point for the further development. The code for my application looks like the in the following.

<div id="myExcelDiv" style="width: 402px; height: 346px"></div>
<script type="text/javascript" 
        src="http://r.office.microsoft.com/r/rlidExcelWLJS?v=1&kip=1"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
// Use this file token to reference Formulas.2010.SP1.xlsx in Excel's APIs
   var fileToken = "___TOKEN___";

// run the Excel load handler on page load
   if (window.attachEvent) {
      window.attachEvent("onload", loadEwaOnPageLoad);
   } else {
      window.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded", 
      loadEwaOnPageLoad, false);
   }

function loadEwaOnPageLoad() 
   {
      var props = {
         uiOptions: {
            showGridlines: false,
            showRowColumnHeaders: false,
            showParametersTaskPane: false
         },
         interactivityOptions: {
            allowTypingAndFormulaEntry: false,
            allowParameterModification: false,
            allowSorting: false,
            allowFiltering: true,
            allowPivotTableInteractivity: false
         }
      };

Ewa.EwaControl.loadEwaAsync(fileToken, "myExcelDiv", 
      props, onEwaLoaded);
   }

function onEwaLoaded(result) 
   {
   }
</script>

As you can see, the code includes some HTML Tags and then a JavaScript block. The div-element is marked with an ID and also has the width and height properties set. A JavaScript file is then retrieved from a Microsoft server and finally a JavaScript block loads and initialize the Excel file from SkyDrive.

Each file on SkyDrive has a token, a specific and unique identifier. I recommend to always use the assistant from SkyDrive for getting the appropriate token for your file. After initializing the token, the function loadEwaOnPageLoad() is attached to the browser event handler in order to call this function when the page or DOM element is loaded. Let’s have a closer look on the function loadEwaOnPageLoad().

In a first step, the function initializes some parameters for controlling the behavior of the Excel file. Their purpose can be relatively easily guessed by their names; “showGridlines” is used to setup if the grid lines should be displayed, “allowSorting” and “allowFiltering” determine whether if it is possible to sort and/or filter the data in the Excel file. The last line of the function loads the file from SkyDrive and passes the ID of the div.

The function onEwaLoaded() permits to execute own code after the Excel file was loaded.

After a testing if all things go fine in a separate HTML file to this blog, I started with my own extensions. For changing the display language of the workbook, the cell value of $J$9 from the Resources sheet may be changed to an appropriate value. The workbook includes the three languages German, English and French; changing the cell value to DE, EN or FR switches the language. The other sheets are then calculated by using formulas.

So, for interacting with the Excel sheet outside from the workbook, I had to implement some code for overwriting the value of $J$9. The best moment to change the value seemed to be when the Excel file is loaded and by using an URL argument. For providing a comfortable way to switch the language, I added three links on the left upper corner of the HTML file.

I also needed a function to overwrite a cell value and, as I will also need this function for more cases, I considered the sheet name, cell row and column, the new value and an option for activating the target sheet to the function arguments’ list. So, the declaration is setValue(Sheet, Row, Column, Value, Activate) and the code is:

Firstly, I need a reference to the EWA-Object (please also see the MSDB article link at the end of this post) and also a reference to the range or cell object. At this point, it is important to know that the row and column values for a cell address are starting with zero. So, $J$9 is not (9, 10) but (8, 9); what I personally find somewhat illogical, as Excel usually assumes 1 as starting row and column.

An array with two dimensions may be used for writing to a cell. If you explore the Excel Mashup samples, you will discover, that they used [[32]] for writing the value 32 to a cell. However, 32 is a static value, I need a variable. So, I declared the array “arrValue”. The reason why the array is required is that you can also use the array to write values to a range containing more than one cell at the same time.

The value itself is written to the cell by calling the EWA function setValuesAsync(), which also expects the name of a callback function. The callback function is called after the operation has been accomplished and, for example, allows to check if an error occurred. The last argument “Activate” in my function just activates the sheet, if needed.

Then I needed a function to extract the URL parameter and check its value for validity. This is done by the function getURLParam(Parameter, Default, Validator) which parses the URL parameter list and verifies the specified value by comparing it with the validator list. The argument “Parameter” defines the URL parameter name, “Default” represents its default value and “Validator” contains the list of valid arguments.

The result from getURLParam() is stored in the global variable “globalLanguage”, as I needed this URL parameter on different places.

For setting up the workbook display language when the Excel file is loaded from SkyDrive, I called my function setValue(“Resources”, 8, 9, globalLanguage, 0) in onEwaLoaded(); which is, as mentioned before, automatically called when the file is loaded.

Let us now talk about the languages for comparing the formulas. The worksheet “Compare” allows to do this task by entering the language codes to the cells $H$9 and $I$9. The formulas are the retrieved from the worksheet “Formulas” by using Excel functions. The possible language codes are listed on the worksheet “Languages”. I thought, a good way to let the user choose the language, should be to use two combo boxes on the upper left corner of the excel file. When the user selects a language, the selected language code should be written to the corresponding cell and the worksheet should also be activated. And, when loading the Excel file, these combo boxes should also be initialized with the current language.

I assigned the function setFormulaLanguage(Target, Value) to the onChange event for each combo box; where “Target” represents the combo box and “Value” corresponds to the selected value. Then I could use the already implemented function setValue() with the correct arguments.

For initializing the combo boxes I had added the function initFormulaLanguage() and assigned this function to the load handler event of the HTML file.

Finally an important note: for getting the value changes work, you may allow that cell values can be changed in cells. For this, it is needed that the parameter “allowTypingAndFormulaEntry“ is set to true in the loadEwaOnPageLoad() function. The full code is presented in the following listing:

// Initialize
   
   var globalToken    = "___TOKEN___";
   var globalLanguage =  getURLParam("UI", "EN", "DE-EN-FR");
   
// Run the Excel load handler on page load...
   
   if (window.attachEvent) 
   {
      window.attachEvent("onload", loadEwaOnPageLoad);
   } 
   else 
   {
      window.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded", loadEwaOnPageLoad, false);
   }
	
// Loader...
   
   function loadEwaOnPageLoad() 
   {
      var props = 
      {
         uiOptions: 
         {
            showGridlines: false,
            showRowColumnHeaders: false,
            showParametersTaskPane: false
         },
         interactivityOptions: 
         {
            allowTypingAndFormulaEntry: true,
            allowParameterModification: false,
            allowSorting: false,
            allowFiltering: true,
            allowPivotTableInteractivity: false
         }
      };
		
      Ewa.EwaControl.loadEwaAsync(globalToken, "excel", props, onEwaLoaded);
   }
	
   function onEwaLoaded(result) 
   {
      setValue("Compare"  , 8, 7, globalLanguage, 0);
      setValue("Compare"  , 8, 8, globalLanguage, 0);
      setValue("Resources", 8, 9, globalLanguage, 0);
   }
   
// URL parameter for choosing the language...
   
   function getURLParam(Parameter, Default, Validator)
   {
      var strValue  = "[\\?&]" + Parameter.replace(/[\[]/,"\\\[").replace(/[\]]/,"\\\]") + "=([^&#]*)";
      var objRegExp = new RegExp(strValue);
      var arrResult = objRegExp.exec(window.location.href);
      
      if (arrResult == null)
      {
         return Default;
      }
      else
      {
         return Validator.indexOf(arrResult[1].toUpperCase()) < 0 ? Default : 
                arrResult[1].toUpperCase();
      }
   }
   
// Languages for comparing formulas...
   
   function initFormulaLanguage() 
   {
      document.forms[0].elements["FL"].value = globalLanguage;
      document.forms[0].elements["SL"].value = globalLanguage;
   }
   
   function setFormulaLanguage(Target, Value) 
   {
      switch (Target)
      {
         case 1  : setValue("Compare", 8, 7, Value, 1); break;
         case 2  : setValue("Compare", 8, 8, Value, 1); break;
         default : break;
      }
   }
   
// Set cell value...
   
   function setValue(Sheet, Row, Column, Value, Activate) 
   {
      var objEwa   = Ewa.EwaControl.getInstances().getItem(0);
      var objRange = objEwa.getActiveWorkbook().getRange(Sheet, Row, Column, 1, 1);
      var arrValue = new Array(0);
      
//    Initialize...
      
      arrValue[0]    = new Array(0);
      arrValue[0][0] = Value;
      
//    Update...
      
      objRange.setValuesAsync(arrValue, actionCallback, null);
      
//    Activate...
      
      if (Activate > 0)
      {
         objRange.getSheet().activateAsync(actionCallback, null);
      }
   }
   
// Callbacks...
   
   function actionCallback(asyncResult)
   {
      window.status = asyncResult.getSucceeded();
   }

The last steps then were to create some CSS styles for a better look of the file.

Embedding the Excel file in a WordPress blog

I added this section to this blog post, as I had some difficulties to integrate the JavaScript code in my blog post. WordPress successfully did not allow to use copy and paste from my editor.

If you like to use JavaScript code in a single blog post without using a plugin, WordPress recommends not to include the source code to the post, but outsource the code to a single JavaScript file and include the code by referencing to the outsourced file. Example: .

While testing my embedded file using the method previously described I had some problems when the Excel file was displayed. The icons on the bottom were misplaced and unusable. This may perhaps be due to my CSS styles, which were probably in conflict with the styles used by the Excel WebApp.

On the other side, I used a separate HTML file for developing the sample. So, I included this file by using an I-Frame, in this case not referring to the Excel file but to my file.

Conclusion

The controls I used outside the Excel WebApp are currently not considering the language the user has chosen for its display language. However, this can be easily be implemented. The strings are included in the Excel file and can, for example, be read by the app.

The interactive embedding features of Excel files from SkyDrive are now offering interesting possibilities for everyone. I’m thinking about evaluations, interactive examples of formulas and functions, tutorials, animations and much more.

Server failure on this domain on 09/26/2011

Mourad Louha — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 12:33:29 +0000

Unfortunately, my provider 1&1 experienced some network configuration problems on 09/26/2011 that have led to a server failure from approximately 14:45 to 16:45 and from 19:45 to 21:30 o’clock (Central Europe time).

Not only this domain was affected, but also several other domain hosted on this server like the German Excel Ticker, the Website about my services, the Excel Formula Translator or the German Office365-Forum.

According to the 1&1 blog, the failure was caused by a faulty network configuration, which in turn was caused by a software.

Excel workbook including the formula translations for 32 languages as a byproduct of the Excel Formula Translator

Mourad Louha — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 14:38:02 +0000

While implementing the Excel Formula Translator in PHP, I created an Excel workbook including all my translations of the Excel formulas, error codes and arguments of the CELL() and INFO() functions. I thought, it would be a good idea to offer the file for free at the end of this article. Please do not hesitate to send me an e-mail or leave a comment here, if you find an error in one of the translations.

To extract the formulas in the different languages, I had firstly inserted all available formulas in a column in the “Formulas” worksheet of the workbook. For this, I used the English version of Excel, as English is my reference language and I sorted all formulas in alphabetical order. Of course, as I am usually using the German version of Excel, I had to install the English language pack.

Once all formulas have been entered, it is relatively easy to implement a macro which reads all formulas from the column by using the FormulaLocal property and just writes the formula name to another column. Excel automatically translates the formulas to the active language, so if you switch to another language and the read and write the formulas, you will automatically get the localized names.

To getting the whole thing a little bit more comfortable, I added a UserForm which checks, if the identifier (LCID) of the active language can be found in a column head. The language identifier is retrieved each time when the workbook is opened. The macro reduced the needed amount of time for translating the formulas to a few minutes.

However, a time consuming task was to download and install all available Office 2010 language packs. Each language pack uses between 300 and 400 MB. The full installation of all language packs consumes, including Windows 7, approximately 40 GB hard disk capacity. But now I know, all language packs can be installed side by side and I did not have any problems.

After I had translated the formulas to a few languages, I added a worksheet for comparing a selected language to another. By this way, I could filter out all languages that use the English formulas without any differences. It is not necessary that these languages are listed in the translator.

Unfortunately, it was not possible to use a macro to translate the Excel error codes and the arguments of the CELL() and INFO() functions. I had to do this manually by switching to each language and typing the translated values. And, sometimes I also had to get help from an online translator, as especially the arguments for the CELL() function are ordered alphabetically and therefore this order differs from the order of the English names.

After all formulas and other elements had been translated, I created a small macro for writing the results to PHP files. This is not very difficult, as in VBA we can easily create a function for writing data in a file on the hard disk.

That’s all. The workbook included in the following download link reflects my current state of all translations and also includes the macro. The worksheets are protected by an empty password and the VBA code is unprotected.

Update on 11/20/2011: I had improved the translator by adding the formula translations for Excel 2010 Service Pack 1. Some translations of Excel Formulas were changed back to the names of Excel 2007 in Excel 2010 SP1. Therefore, two workbooks are now available with the translations. Current Version is Version 1.75.

Online Excel Formula Translator Version 1.50

Mourad Louha — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 16:32:18 +0000

I recently released version 1.50 of my free online Excel Formula Translator. The translator can be used to translate both single Excel Formulas and combined complex formulas. For example the formula =PROPER(MID(A1;FIND(“.”;A1)+1;FIND(“@”;A1)-FIND(“.”;A1)-1)) to extract the first and last name from an e-Mail address is translated to =NOMPROPRE(STXT(A1;TROUVE(“.”;A1)+1;TROUVE(“@”;A1)-TROUVE(“.”;A1)-1)) in French.

MSDN actually provides 43 language packs for Microsoft Office 2010, which I downloaded and installed in a virtual machine. I then compared the Excel functions, the Excel error codes and the arguments of some specific functions to the English version. And I have found 32 languages which have differences and included these languages in the translator.

However, in some languages the differences are minimal. For example, the only difference I found in the Japanese language pack is the DOLLAR() function which was replaced by YEN(). Another example is Thai, where the only difference is the argument “System” for the INFO() function. So, for these languages, the translator will in most cases return the same result as for English.

The translator is also able to translate the arguments for the CELL() and INFO() functions. For example, the German formula ZELLE(“Dateiname”) is translated to CELL(“filename”) in English or to ЯЧЕЙКА(“имяфайла”) in Russian.

Another feature of the translator is the possibility to translate Excel error codes from one language to another. For example, #VALUE! is translated to #WERT! in German, to #¡VALOR! in Spanish or to #ΤΙΜΗ! in Greek. However, the translator currently expects that the error code is encapsulated by a function name. So, if you just would like to translate the error code, you may use a function like T(#VALUE!), where it does not matter if the argument makes sense in the function. A later version of the translator will allow to pass the error codes by their own.

An option in the translator allows the replacement of commas with semicolons and vice versa. Since the argument separator also depends on the regional settings of the operating system, I thought, it would be better to let the user decide what to do instead of automatically translate the separators.

Last but not least, I implemented a new parser for the formulas (also faster compared to the previous versions) and I created a fan page on Facebook where a version of the translator is also included via an app.

Some time ago, the translator has been connected to the Microsoft Office Help forum (it’s in english but has an automatic translator), where the users can use an embedded version of the translator without leaving the forum. The translator also includes an additional option for adding BB-Code to the output formula. The translation itself takes place on my server, meaning that’s easier to do updates.

At this point, I would like to thank Simon Lloyd, forum administrator, who allowed the integration to the forum and also created a button visible in each thread of the Excel forums for quickly accessing the translator. So far, the feedback for the translator is very positive.

Finally, the development of the translator is far away from being complete, many new features are planned. So please stay tuned.

Excel Add-In for listing all trusted documents and folders in Office

Mourad Louha — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 11:40:23 +0000

Occasionally I am also active in the French Microsoft Office TechNet forum, on one hand to practice my French and on the other hand just out of curiosity. Some time ago, someone asked there whether it is possible to retrieve a list of all trusted documents of Word 2010.

Unfortunately the Trust Center of Office 2010 does not offer a possibility to see which documents have been added to the trusted list of documents.

So I had the idea to implement a free Excel Add-In and list all trusted documents in an Excel sheet. And, when I am at it, I thought it should be a good idea to implement a function for listing all trusted folders too. And I should include the trusted documents and folders for PowerPoint, Word and Excel from Office 2007 and Office 2010.

I firstly implemented a German version of the Add-In and published it on my German Blog. Today, I translated the Add-In to English and I am happy to publish these versions here.

On its launch, the Add-In firstly checks whether Office 2010 and/or Office 2007 are installed. If Excel, PowerPoint and Word are found, then the checkboxes for the category are enabled and can be selected. The category “Actions” allows to specify if the trusted folder and/or the trusted documents may be retrieved. Of course, the feature for trusting documents is not available in Office 2007. So, if only Office 2007 is installed, then the checkboxes for searching for the trusted documents are disabled.

If you click on the red arrow on the lower left side of the dialogue, you will reach the next page. If the option “List trusted folders” is checked, the Add-In will automatically scan the Windows registry for the trusted folders for the previously selected applications.

Clicking again on the red arrow leads you to the next page for scanning the trusted documents; of course only if the options were checked on the first page of the dialogue and Office 2010 is installed. The scan also starts immediately.

Please note, that the Add-In only searches for the trusted documents from the user who is currently logged on the system. I am not planning to extend the Add-In with functions for searching the trusted documents for other users. So, if you need the list of trusted documents for another user, you may login with this user credentials.

The next page leads to the report features of the Add-In. Currently, only the option for creating a new workbook is active; I am planning to add the possibility to choose a template in the next versions of the Add-In.

Just click on the icon with the small green arrows for creating the report. That’s all, the Add-In creates one sheet for the trusted documents and one sheet for the trusted folders.

Important notes

As mentioned before, the Add-In is free. However, on its first launch, a dialogue is displayed including the license terms which may be accepted. An important point is that, if you are using the Add-in, this gives you no rights to one of my trademarks or to the documentation and icons included. And, I assume no liability for damages of any kind and no warranty is given. The use is at your sole risk.

The Add-In was tested in Windows 7 and Excel 2003, Excel 2007 and Excel 2010 in the three languages German, English and French. As the Add-In uses some Windows 32 Bit API functions and controls, the Add-In will not run on a pure 64 Bit system.

I have not tested the Add-In on more systems; so if you are using it for the first time, I recommend to not have open important documents when using it. If you like to give me feedback, suggest new features or if you find a bug, please feel free to post a comment here or contact me via e-Mail to the e-Mail address mentioned on the imprint page of this blog. Finally the download link for the Add-In.

Download Excel Add-In Version 1.00 Build 010711, English

Start of our forum for Office365 at www.office365-forum.de

Mourad Louha — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 09:31:05 +0000

Two days ago (July 1st, 2011), we started our forum for a German speaking audience and unlocked the user registration. We would like to thank to all developers from “Simple Machines” for creating a great forum software which is easy to administer and also already has a pleasant default layout.

We have created categories including forums for the Office Web Apps and for the e-Mail, calendar, team and communication features of Office365. A category offers forums for discussions about the administrative tasks in Office365. Another category is provided for collecting tips and tricks, book and website recommendations from our users and for linking to news from Microsoft about Office365.

The next steps will be to create a specific design, of course standards compliant, and to add some interesting features for the forum. I am also preparing the migration to a new provider as the current provider unfortunately does not satisfy my needs.