Excel Progress Monitoring System - A "Should-be" Handy Excel Toy

Here's a new tool for me to monitor my task and sub-tasks progress (oh yes I am well-organized. =) ). Have fun. =)


Screenshots:



^~ (my list. Too many To-Do.s.... sigh....) Name: Progress Monitoring System v0.8

Description: A small tool for office people to monitor all his/her tasks (and sub-tasks) progress with ease (and fancy looking! XD)

Download Here: Click Me

Origin: As multi-tasking is becoming more significant during my work, I need to have something to keep track on my little task in details, especially for those requiring a link-by-link checking during UAT. An Excel-based non-macro tool is thus developed for such dirty task.

Good:
- Excel-based without any embedded macro script, perfectly fits those business PC with MS Office + high security check
- The appearance is designed to be similar to a reporting tool, fairly easy to present to your boss if he/she would like to "learn" more about your progress (kind-of show-off to me. =P)
- Support maximum a four-level-depth task description (i.e. a 1.3.2 level task .... etc.)

Bad:
- May not be user friendly enough (as lack of support of macros)
- Not easy to start without manual (Personally, I prefer no-manual-and-no-experience-required tools =) )
- Difficult for maintenance due to heavy usage of cell referencing and conditional formatting.


Simple Tutorial: (it's simply too large to fit in here, so please click to enlarge if necessary)



Further To-Do:
- May convert to Google Excel program.
- User Manual will be created in a day or two. (Done!~)


Feel free to let me know what do you think.

Dickson W.



P.S. This is also the first entry for "A.I. Eve's Toys Collection" label, a portion of my blog that stores mainly my "little toys", plus, a portion of Nekotopia's story. We shall see. =)

Yeah! Finished Derren's book! - Finally.

So finally finished Derren's book Tricks of the Mind.

Rarely I would re-read any books (even lecture notes btw), yet this one is simply too innovative for being read once only. As long as you are interested in social psychology, or social science, or NLP, or magic tricks, or his shows, or, his belief and belief on others' believes, you should definitely give it a shot.

I would like to type in some of his content later (for some reason), sometime when I have mood, and spare time.




Gonna try the Fooled by Randomness, again. After three years of abandonment, as well as completion of some other English books, well, I think I should be ready for this tough little one....... (my English was bad, and it is still no good at all.....)


===

Still waiting for the arrival of my Christmas present, the Web Analytics : An Hour a Day written by Avinash Kaushik. =)

A Youtube for All of Us - Oh, Really?

Nay, it’s Google’s. =P

Announcement of algorithmic demotion in Youtube has caused lots of voice in the community. Well, pretty negative though.

It happened on 2nd December 2008, an entry with a header “Youtube for All of Us” was written, showing a very positive intention that Youtube really wants to keep its community clean and healthy for everyone, however, maybe, in a wrong way. As quoted in the entry, “Demotion of sexually suggestive content and profanity - Videos that are considered sexually suggestive, or that contain profanity, will be algorithmically demoted ....” What?! Algorithmically?!... It may be relatively-easier to seek for sexually suggestive post automatically (well, maybe), yet I really don’t know how such in-human method can search for clues to proof for profanity… Yeah, I did once-upon-time hate people playing around with my nickname Dickson (I do believe in you that you are a good person, aren’t you?), but I think that I might need to start worrying if I use my “censored” name as an username on Youtube, or whatever post crediting my name will simply be demoted, algorithmically, by our lovely bots on Youtube, because of having something that Youtube doesn’t what to see. If so, then it’s really not that difficult to understand why so many Youtubers have posted numerous of videos with long *beep* sound and censored words. Really, I do understand their anger.

“Oh honey, be cool, Youtube isn’t really that bad, they are for Us, aren’t they?” True, especially when the Us means only Goolge. (And that’s why they can come up with those not-so-human-friendly complex automated demoting bots to handle such dirty task.)

A Chinese quote 成事在人, means “People is a matter of Successes”, well, correct, and so does failure.

The Web 2.0 generation is a internet generation that treats people in its highest priority. (as they DO matter). Although I am interested in how the algorithmic demotion functions (and implemented), I do also want to see the Blackout event on Youtube, hosted by Youtuber, started on 19th Dec (should be lasted for a few days, correctly me if I’m wrong). Participants will not enter Youtube for days (not even browse) and thus cases a shape drop on Youtube’s traffic-metter. You know, traffics mean LOTS of money on the net. Oh, that’s REALLY hurt.


Be understanding and concerning for your visitors, you may not need to create everything that they desire, but just be respectful, and you will still survive or even earn some pocket money for being yourself and having some uniqueness.


Cheers,
Dickson



P.S. You can now easily find those angry video on Youtube, or you may go to Youtube's blog for more details of the announcement.