Spy Journal 3.0 Filtering the web for you

The Ribbon and Backstage

Ok not everybody's favourite feature first time they switch from Office 2003. It does take some getting used to – and I still use keyboard short cuts for things. However the contextually sensitive ribbon has some major advantages over the old system. I honestly prefer the ribbon now especially in Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Word. In Office 2010 the ribbon can also be personalised.

The backstage view (access from the File menu now places in one easy place all file management tasks such as save, share and print. All the similar commands are grouped together. No more going to 3-4 different places to set print settings for an excel file.

Here's the best way to think about the Ribbon and Backstage.

• The Ribbon is for everything you want to do in a document – insert stuff, format stuff, change stuff.
• The Backstage area is for everything you want to do with a document – print it, save it , share it etc.

Sparklines and Pivot Tables

If you thought pivot tables were cool ways to play with (analyse) data before than wait until you play with the sexy new pivot tables in Excel 2010.

And sparklines (inline in cell micro charts) are an excellent way of demonstrating trends in a small space. I can’t wait to start incorporating some of these features for some of our clients when they upgrade.

Check this pivot table taken from timesheet data. I added the pivot chart and sparklines in about 3 minutes flat.

James and I headed off to the Valley tonight for a most fun photoshoot. Alloneword Bar is part inside and part outside – the back part is a courtyard of wasted space between buildings that has been turned into a funky little arty spot. The walls have been painted with amazing art lit up by spotlights.

The event was organised by the Handful of Fragments Collective, a group whose aim is to showcase young emerging artists, visual, theatric, artists and musicians. Moneth Montemayor is a friend of a friend and the Artistic Director. She is also a guitarist in the band The Mothership. So I got invited to shoot the bands and other activities. James came along to carry my gear, assist with the flashes which we had to keep moving to light up the bands and stage areas and swap out my lenses for me. He also has some great ideas for angles and photo composition.

The following photos are a small representation of the photos from the night. The rest of them are up on flickr in the Alloneword Bar Handful of Fragments Collective Set.

Wall Art

I just finished upgrading SpyJournal’s backend for a whole bunch of modules and the Core Drupal system. After finishing I checked some stats and did a bit of back tracking.

Here are some interesting places I found myself in before getting bored with egosurfing.

Real Website worth – this site is currently worth $857.04. I would value it a lot higher and the data doesnt appear to be very accurate. It does say I’m ranked 567895 on Alexa. My page rank is also 3 not 2.

Photos for sale websites

I got a link posted on Egghead cafe as an answer to conditional formatting in Excel by a user called C_A_P

Wholinkstome – extremely under represented here!

I got linked in a MSDN community site for Excel VBA

Rebecca Bollwitt (Miss 604) and I got linked to on …ology – see my original Geek girls article on Miss 604

Lots of top Google searches for all sorts of things including pornograpy (yeah spelt wrong), various Excel and VBA searches, Power Pivot, OneNote, AFL training schedules,

For those who haven't caught up with the news, we have sold the Jethro businesses to IT Integrity and are now working for IT Integrity as a Business Manager. As a salaried employee again for the first time in 15 years (although I am part owner of the business) it means I now get to have publics holidays and annual leave. I have also continued with my scheduling of family time in my diary.

Yesterday I took the kids up to the park  behind our house while Jude went shopping. Jade and I decided to go on a bit of a photo hunt while Erin and Mercedes took their paper planes to fly. Miranda lay down on a chair and watched!

The following pictures tell the story of what we did at Cockatoo Crest Park.

I liked the shot I got of Mercedes about to launch her plane. Erin loved to run and launch herself into the swing stomach first. Then Jade and I took some water shots, the dribbling tap, followed by the three kids collaborating to produce water anklets. Erin ended up standing on top while Mercedes pushed the button so Jade and I could get shots.