Charts and Graphs: Microsoft Excel 2010 (MrExcel Library) 1st Edition

I've taught both MBA and Master's in Management classes online and physically at MIT, Harvard (GE Crotonville) and Phoenix State University. There are a group of about 3-5 texts that are now the most popular for graduate Quantitative Analysis (QA). These include the Swift text (most popular in Europe) at from $40 to $80 US ( Quantitative Methods: For Business, Management and Finance ), the Render Quantitative Analysis for Management text ( Quantitative Analysis for Management (11th Edition) ), $175 for the 11th edition, and the very thorough but NOT for self study Anderson text ( Quantitative Methods for Business (with Printed Access Card) ) for $250.QA is a really tough course for people with less math background such as liberal arts, nursing, etc. students going for an MBA, and a bit easier for math and engineering majors in undergrad, because it involves modeling, using a lot of fairly advanced math. Typical QA courses include linear programming (not really linear, and not really programming-- it is about objectives and constraints stated algebraically to find "optimal" graphic or corner solutions to problems such as mixing, profit maximization, or cost minimization); queueing problems; statement analysis; Decision analysis; Project Management; Forecasting; Inventory Control; Logistics; Markov Analysis; Stats; Integer/ nonlinear/ goal programming; regression modeling; simulation; probability, and possibly some econometrics. Most grad (MBA) courses don't go as far as differential equation modeling (frequent models in physics, biosciences, ecology, etc).The Swift and Render texts are the most popular, and the Anderson text a distant third according to publisher's (QA!) data on course use and sales. Both Swift and Render are frequently zinged in reviews for broken or less useful software and models, but this is an unfair criticism. Swift gives numerous (although London oriented) model examples, and Render has their own internet models available. The reason both of these criticisms are unfair is that there are numerous plug ins for Excel that do all the analysis, statistics, programming solutions, etc. you will need regardless of which text you use. The Library Picks team chose Render as the top pick, but due to expense, if you're doing self study, Swift is also a good bet.If the included websites, plug ins, templates and downloads aren't working for you from a software/ modeling viewpoint, here is a brief list of outstanding Excel options that will do the same thing, many for free:--  Statistical Analysis: Microsoft Excel 2010 --  Business Analysis: Microsoft Excel 2010 (MrExcel Library) --  Predictive Analytics: Microsoft Excel --  Microsoft Excel 2010: Data Analysis and Business Modeling --  Charts and Graphs: Microsoft Excel 2010 (MrExcel Library) These will take care of the problems metioned by some reviewers that it is hard to stay up to date on models. In particular, Microsoft has now migrated their SQL server business analysis package to a new language called DAX in the FREE Excel plug in PowerPivot. These plug ins, many free on the web, will work perfectly with the examples in Swift and Render so you don't have to sweat the included QA software if it crashes.One caveat: many reviews complain about QA software with "bugs" when in fact it is the reviewer's computer at fault. To run modern QA programs with lots of modeling, you need a modern dual core processor with at LEAST 8 gig of ram, preferably 12 or 16. The reason for this is that with pipelining, the old "math coprocessor" hardware has given way to sharing between CPU and GPU for floating point, and recent software-- even SPSS -- will crash older machines or appear to be buggy. Excel with a plug in also is a great answer to this, because you can get away with much less power if your machine is already doing well with Excel. PowerPivot is intensive, but only if you have huge amounts of data. The typical mixing problem is no problem even with a computer that's say, post 2009.

This is an amazing book. I teach Excel, and I don't have time to Google things for hours to learn my trade. Besides the fact that this was the ONLY dedicated Excel 2010 book I could find (I didn't look too hard though), I have to say it is truly a stellar book. Well-organized, great examples, clear and clean writing style - a MUST HAVE!!!So why only 4 stars?Because even though the examples are terrific - they do not include a CD with the book, nor could I find the examples online. Worse, I wanted to recreate the charts in the book but most of the pictures only show the resulting charts and not the data that went into making them. Even a photo of the data sets would allow me to recreate them when I read it - and this is not a book you just are going to pick up and read out of boredom; you want to read for understanding and mastery.I have Mr. Excel's Pivot Table and Number Crunching book; it too is absolutely fabulous but suffers the same problem. In that books's case, the exercise files are available online but they simply do not correspond to the text very well - I spent a LOT of time massaging the files until they bear a reasonable resemblance to the original, but I shouldn't have to spend hours at that.Bill Jelen, are you listening? Your stuff is FABULOUS man, but you've got to beef up the example engine.Thanks,Mike

I got my money's worth from this book in the first few minutes of reading it. I sometimes find Excel's charting feature hard to use. I am a scientist and therefore think in terms of x and y, in terms of dependent and independent variables, and not in terms of "categories" and "series", like Excel. This means I used to have to spend more time than I like getting a graph or chart to look just right for a professional presentation.Not so anymore! This book really helps you quickly understand how Excel gets your data into a graph. It does not waste your time with a lot of verbose text.If you get the Kindle version, you can easily search for just the information you need at the moment. I have the Kindle version, but I have been reading it on an iPad in the computer lab at my university. It is so easy to use and much better than carrying around a heavy book.

Looked through all the Excel books at Barnes & Noble yesterday, and this one seemed by far the most helpful.The author doesn't just talk about HOW to create a certain chart, he describes WHY you would want to use one chart vs another to communicate info.I will probably buy the Kindle version so I can easily search it. However because it's so visual this would be a good one to have in pulp as well.I particularly liked:1) the paired comparison chart how-to, with the examples from how Mad Magazine used them2) the positive-neutral-negative chart example from Gene Zelazny? at McKinsey

i like this book and the content covered my interest. But i find the following disadvantages:before paying the book i have Searched inside the book by using amazon website and i find the writing is very clear and excel snapshot is colored and clear. but my copy is not clear and the writing totally not clear (i think the book printed by using printer with empty ink!!) and excel snapshot is not colored not same that in "Search inside this book" menu in amazon web site.before paying the book i advise my colleges to buy a copy but they want to see my feedback before the buy it and i am actually didn’t recommend the book.The content is very important but the quality of printing is also important and i will not buy any book written by Mr.Bill again.

From what I've gotten into so far, it's basic... Lots of discussion on date vs text axis but no mention on how to align 2 Y's... I really thought I'd get more out of this book than I have at this point.

I am not really using this for stocks, but it is insightful and will help me get some of the rather mundane charts in Excel somewhat more appealing and useful.

Easy to follow and very useful.

I bought it to help with an OU course I'm taking. It's good but fiddly to use as an ebook.

Good product !