Excel Tip

This should come in handy for most Excel Users!!

Status bar statistics (Excel)

The status bar in Excel shows handy statistics when multiple cells are selected. In Excel 2007, the status bar shows the selected cells' average, count, and sum. This is an easy way to quickly analyze data without authoring formulas.

Thought for the Day : 90 / 10 Principle

Snippets from Author - Juliette Powell’s online interview about how social networking can actually aid your company

• Companies should tap into audience and clients opinions and feedback via social networking e.g.) Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn.

• They should have conversations with their staff members to get their opinions and feedback. This is how you can discover the more applicable market for your company.

• The more employees are connected with Each other and with people in the same industry as your company, the more resource information is available for your company.

• Draw up Guidelines that reflect the culture and future of your company.

• The flow of information in your company shouldn’t just be top-down, but it should be dialogue, not dictatorship.

God and the Geese

There was once a man who didn't believe in God, and he didn't hesitate to let others know how he felt about religion and religious holidays.


His wife, however, did believe, and she raised their children to also have faith in God and Jesus, despite his disparaging comments. One snowy Eve, his wife was taking their children to service in the farm community in which they lived.
They were to talk about Jesus' birth. She asked him to come, but he refused.
"That story is nonsense!" he said. "Why would God lower Himself to come to Earth as a man? That's ridiculous!"


So she and the children left, and he stayed home. A while later, the winds grew stronger and the snow turned into a blizzard. As the man looked out the window, all he saw was a blinding snowstorm. He sat down to relax before the fire for the evening. Then he heard a loud thump. Something had hit the window. He looked out, but couldn't see more than a few feet. When the snow let up a little, he ventured outside to see
what could have been beating on his window.

In the field near his house he saw a flock of wild geese. Apparently they had been flying south for the winter when they got caught in the snowstorm and couldn't go on. They were lost and stranded on his farm, with no food or shelter. They just flapped their wings and flew around the field in low circles, blindly and aimlessly. A couple of them had flown into his window, it seemed.


The man felt sorry for the geese and wanted to help them. The barn would be a great place for them to stay, he thought. It's warm and safe; surely they could spend the night and wait out the storm. So he walked over to the barn and opened the doors wide, then watched and waited, hoping they would notice the open barn and go inside.


But the geese just fluttered around aimlessly and didn't seem to notice the barn or realize what it could mean for them. The man tried to get their attention, but that just seemed to scare them, and they moved further away. He went into the house and came with some bread, broke it up, and made a bread crumb trail leading to the barn. They still didn't catch on.

Now he was getting frustrated. He got behind them and tried to shoo them toward the barn, but they only got more scared and scattered in every direction except toward the barn. Nothing he did could get them to go into the barn where they would be warm and safe. "Why don't they follow me?!" he exclaimed.
"Can't they see this is the only place where they can survive the
storm?"


He thought for a moment and realized that they just wouldn't follow a human.
"If only I were a goose, then I could save them," he said out loud. Then he had an idea. He went into barn, got one of his own geese, and carried it in his arms as he circled around behind the flock of wild geese.


He then released it. His goose flew through the flock and straight into the barn -- and one-by-one, the other geese followed it to safety. He stood silently for a moment as the words he had spoken a few minutes earlier replayed in his mind: "If only I were a goose, then I could save them!" Then he thought about what he had said to his wife earlier. "Why would God want to be like us? That's ridiculous!"


Suddenly it all made sense. That is what God had done. We were like the geese--blind, lost, perishing. God had His Son become like us so He could show us the way and save us.


As the winds and blinding snow died down, his soul became quiet and pondered this wonderful thought. Suddenly he understood why Christ had come.
Years of doubt and disbelief vanished with the passing storm. He fell to his knees in the snow, and prayed his first prayer:


"Thank You, God, for coming in human form to get me out of the storm!"

Services

Perhaps the single biggest complaint we get from readers concerns service. Herewith some thoughts on this touchy subject.

I became confused when I heard the word 'service' used with these agencies: South African Revenue 'Service', Postal 'Service', Telephone 'Service', Municipal 'Service', Civil ’Service’, South African Police 'Service' and the general disclaimer Customer 'Service'.

This was not what I thought 'service' meant, but today, I overheard two farmers talking, and one of them said he had hired a bull to 'service' a few cows.

Suddenly it all came into focus.  Now I understand what all those agencies are doing to us.

:-)

Application Architecture and Design

ASP.NET 3.5 Application Architecture and Design by Vivek Thakur. I am reading this book , and I have decided to jot down a few notes of my interpretation and some excerpts, as I read it. I have posted the link of where the book can be bought, for those interested.

Business Needs
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       "
       "
Application Architecture
       "
       "
       "
Design
      "
      "
      "
Development



Business Needs:- Business Specifications are done by the Business Analysts and Project Stake Holders.    They determine the business needs of the project.

Application Architecture:- Is the Blueprint. It defines the limits and boundaries of the project, where all business aspects and requirements are met and taken care of.  Different Architectural styles have been grouped together with famous approaches and techniques used widely.

Architectural Styles represent a particular interaction and behaviour pattern between the system and it's components, along with a particular layout. e.g.)

• n-tier
• Service Orientated Architecture (SOA)

It is important to understand the styles, so that you can decide which one to use in your application architecture approach. New styles can also be created by combining them and/or customising any of them to achieve a greater efficiency and adaptability.

 Design:- Designing the actual program. Involves Programming Techniques and Patterns of design. Laying out the basic Solution Framework

Made 1 Mistake Today

Letter from Zimbabwe

Terrible, terrible things are taking place in Zimbabwe by the communist thugs that rule the place. the internet is a powerful tool and the only way that this madman and his henchmen are going to be brought to justice is if the whole world gangs up up on them and topples their evil bastion once and for all. 

Please forward this everyone you know so it gets around the world in a few days. 

Letter from Zimbabwe sent in by John Winter

I reckon that these are the last days of TKM and ZPF. The darkest hour is always before dawn.
We are all terrified at what they are going to destroy next........I mean they are actually ploughing down brick and mortar houses and one family with twin boys of 10 had no chance of salvaging anything when 100 riot police came in with AK47's and bulldozers and demolished their beautiful house - 5 bedrooms and pine ceilings - because it was 'too close to the airport', so we are feeling extremely insecure right now.

You know - I am aware that this does not help you sleep at night, but if you do not know - how can you help? Even if you put us in your own mental ring of light and send your guardian angels to be with us - that is a help -but I feel so cut off from you all knowing I cannot tell you what's going on here simply because you will feel uncomfortable. There is no ways we can leave here so that is not an option.

I ask that you all pray for us in the way that you know how, and let me know that you are thinking of us and sending out positive vibes... that's all. You can't just be in denial and pretend/believe it's not going on.

To be frank with you, it's genocide in the making and if you do not believe me, read the Genocide Report by Amnesty International which says we are - IN level 7 - (level 8 is after it's happened and everyone is in denial).

If you don't want me to tell you these things-how bad it is-then it means you have not dealt with your own fear, but it does not help me to think you are turning your back on our situation. We need you, please, to get the news OUT that we are all in a fearfully dangerous situation here. Too many people turn their backs and say - oh well, that's what happens in Africa

This Government has GONE MAD and you need to help us publicize our plight---or how can we be rescued? It's a reality! The petrol queues are a reality, the pall of smoke all around our city is a reality, the thousands of homeless people sleeping outside in 0 Celsius with no food, water, shelter and bedding are a reality. Today a family approached me, brother of the gardener's wife with two small children. Their home was trashed and they will have to sleep outside. We already support 8 adult people and a child on this property, and electricity is going up next month by 250% as is water.

How can I take on another family of 4 -----and yet how can I turn them away to sleep out in the open?

I am not asking you for money or a ticket out of here - I am asking you to FACE the fact that we are in deep and terrible danger and want you please to pass on our news and pictures. So PLEASE don't just press the delete button! Help best in the way that you know how.

Do face the reality of what is going on here and help us SEND OUT THE WORD.. The more people who know about it, the more chance we have of the United Nations coming to our aid. Please don't ignore or deny what's happening.

Some would like to be protected from the truth BUT then, if we are eliminated, how would you feel? 'If only we knew how bad it really was we could have helped in some way'.

[I know we chose to stay here and that some feel we deserve what's coming to us]

For now,--- we ourselves have food, shelter, a little fuel and a bit of money for the next meal - but what is going to happen next? Will they start on our houses? All property is going to belong to the State now. I want to send out my Title Deeds to one of you because if they get a hold of those, I can't fight for my rights.

Censorship!----We no longer have SW radio [which told us everything that was happening] because the Government jammed it out of existence - we don't have any reporters, and no one is allowed to photograph. If we had reporters here, they would have an absolute field day. Even the pro-Government Herald has written that people are shocked, stunned, bewildered and blown mindless by the wanton destruction of many folks homes, which are supposed to be 'illegal' but for which a huge percentage actually do have licenses.

Please! - do have some compassion and HELP by sending out the articles and personal reports so that something can/may be done.

'I am one. I cannot do everything, ---but I can do something.. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do. What I can do, I should do. And what I should do, by the grace of God, I will do.'

Edward Everett Hale

Please send this on to everyone in your address book. We send jokes out
without blinking an eyelid. We don't get told this on the news in South Africa , we only get told what they want us to hear. We all have a chance to do something, even though the something is by pressing forward to as many people as possible. Let's stop talking and let's start doing! There is power in prayer, there is also power in more people knowing about this than you in my address book. This is going to America , Dubai , Australia , France , South Africans all over South Africa , the UK . By forwarding this to all in my address book I have done something. The world needs to know what is going on.

Study: IT pay up in three areas, down elsewhere

Highest paying individual skills included security tools and SAP's NetWeaver.

While salaries for IT skills on the whole dropped in the US last quarter, according to a study by Foote Partners, three areas saw an increase in pay despite the troubled economy.
The recent results of Foote's Foote Partners' IT Skills and Certifications Pay Index found the first overall decline since mid-2004. Foote saw a .5 percent decline in the fourth quarter of 2008, compared to the third quarter.

"It was inevitable for skills pay to start reflecting the hard times we're in," explains David Foote, co-founder and CEO of Foote Research, in the report. "But the big difference this time around is the strong counter-trending. We've never seen anything quite like this before."
That counter-trending is what Foote called "an urgent demand for talent" in three areas: management/methodology/process, database, and messaging and communications skills.

Management/methodology/process pay leapt upward by 5.6 percent, while IT folks with database skills generated 2.9 percent more, and messaging and communications professionals garnered 2.9 percent more money during last year's fourth quarter.
The report also found several skills that have decreased in value during the last quarter, including application development, SAP and other enterprise application, operating systems, Web/e-commerce, and systems networking skills.

The highest paying individual skills in the same time period, meanwhile, included security tools and SAP's NetWeaver.
Foote Partners' IT Skills and Certifications Pay Index concentrates on the pay for 354 skills and certifications earned by 22,550 IT professionals in the US and Canada.
 
Taken from : http://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/article/274842/study_it_pay_up_three_areas_down_elsewhere?fp=4&fpid=762454&eid=130