Custom Development: Examples

The following is a brief sampling of recent projects. Clients include individuals and companies in Finance, Sales and Marketing, and Science and Engineering. End users range from programmers and experts in Excel to those with no computer skills.

Chart Zoomer


The chart zoomer captures chart events, and allows the user to select a region of a chart and expand the axes to zoom in on the selected region.

At right the user selects a portion of the chart, here a simple sine wave, for a closer look. Below the user again selects part of the zoomed chart for an even closer look, below right.

This technique allows the user to get a better look at a subset of the data. With minor modifications it could also help include or exclude data, for example, in a follow-up statistical analysis.
Point Highlighter

 

A chart events technique similar to the Chart Zoomer above allows a user to select individual points in a chart. At right, some points have been selected, and are shown encircled in red. Clicking on a point displays or removes the highlight. When finished, the user clicks the button and the program processes the points. In this case, the points are listed on the dialog below.

 

 
Example Dialog Boxes

 

One key to a successful project is a clear user interface. Here are a few examples of the dialogs that we have developed to help users quickly steer the operation of the project and modify their output.

 

 
   
 
   
 
   
 
       
Customized Presentation Builder

The sales agent requests information from the client prior to the sales call. The information is entered into a series of Visual Basic forms.

 

With the click of a button, the information is imported into Excel, where charts and tables update automatically.

 
 
 

The PowerPoint file is then populated
with the updated Excel tables and charts,
customized for the current client.

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Stock Option Tracker

This utility imports stock prices from another workbook. The prices are charted with an exponential moving average, and additional charts show oscillation and volatility in the stock price. Through a form the user selects upper and lower prices and an option expiry date.

The project includes the ability to update a single options workbook or all workbooks in a user-defined list. The program looks for updated templates when a file is opened, and automatically converts the workbook if a newer template is found. This compound chart can be exported to an intranet web site.
 

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Traffic Analyzer

Speed monitoring equipment stored text files with time of day and speed for every passing vehicle. This utility loaded the text file into Excel, and allowed the user to prepare a report of the entire data set, or of a selected subset of the data, using sliders in the dashboard worksheet (shown above). Other options could be invoked with check boxes or by typing desired values where displayed in red.

A report summarizing the selected data could be printed out using a specially formatted worksheet .

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Market Opportunity Matrix

A marketing executive fills out information in a dashboard worksheet to define different markets, and the sales volume and growth trends in those markets. The information is displayed in a small chart beside the working table.

A report optimized for printing is generated on another sheet.
 

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Building Systems (HVAC) Tracker

Analyzed logged data to indicate where equipment (codes A thorough J) turned on (blue) and off (red), on chart of temperature and other system parameters. Charts were exported for site-wide browsing. Code to label charts was integrated with client's reporting code.
 

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