I was working on a demo file about Excel’s new Data Types but I found an incredible set of templates created by Elisabetta Caldesi!
Data Type Templates
Template link (Microsoft Tech Community).
Full List of Elisabetta’s Templates:
- Favorite movie list
- Periodic table
- Planets & Comets
- Stars & Constellations
- U.S. college decision helper
- Relocation helper
- Baby name tracker
- Nutrition tracker
- Recipe analyzer
- Fitness tracker
- Investment tracker
I reviewed and recommend ‘Planets and Comets’ and ‘Favorite Movie List’.
Why Am I Impressed?
I’m critical of poorly designed spreadsheets but these are great. Why?
- design: effortlessly explore/navigate the content. Smart use of font size, instructions, space.
- functionality: slicer displays smaller amounts of info (easier to read). Images added via a simple formula =IFERROR(F7.image, “No image”). Dynamic arrays reduce amount of required formulas.
- discovery: learn tons of facts about planets. Use movie template to start endless conversations.
Seen below is sheet ‘Solar system by the numbers’ from Planets & Comets.
This kind of functionality was pure fantasy when I started working with Excel 20 years ago.
Sample Formula
Caldesi used various Dynamic Arrays in the templates including this one:
=TRANSPOSE(INDEX(SORTBY(tblMovies[#Data],tblMovies[My Rating ★],-1,tblMovies[Title],1),SEQUENCE(10),1))
Tips & Info
- remember to correctly spell a movie title
- clarify when there’s a duplicate name
- not all movies are recognized. Empty description fields could create errors in sheet Dashboard
- i have a SurfacePro (small screen) so I modified row/column height in a few places
- these DataTypes may not be allowed on your work computer and may not work on all Excel versions. I have Microsoft 365 office insider edition
My Movie List
I played around with the template and added a few movies to get started. I also added a Watch List.
Movie Stuff
I’m frequently guessing an actor’s age or saying “he/she was in that other movie!”.
Last night we were re-watching GroundHog Day. I had never noticed that Michael Shannon was in the movie! Also in the movie was Brian Doyle-Murray (Bill Murray’s brother!). Another brother, not in the movie, is Joel Murray (MadMen).
A month ago I noticed that comedian Ron James had a minor line in Strange Brew. I recommend Strange Brew only if you are in a goofy mood.
About Me
My name is Kevin Lehrbass. I’ve been a Data Analyst for 20 years now.
I struggled to think of an interesting blog post to start the year until I stumbled across these cool templates. Elisabetta did a great job designing these templates. I wonder what else she’ll create?!
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