Its been one and a half year since I started this blog. For the first few months, I thought I was writing only to myself (I still sometimes do when I don’t get too many comments for a couple of days at a stretch). But, things have been great lately.
The blog now receives a respectable number of visits a day and while that is good in itself, the better part is that they have tended to increase over time (ok count December out of that, holidays aren’t a blog’s best friend ๐ ) The blog also now has a sizable readership through feedburner and more importantly again, increasing. (If you haven’t already subscribed, please don’t do it beacuse I am telling you to do so … wink …. wink …)
Here’s another cool thing. You will see what I mean when you type ‘databison’ in google.
Probably more than anything, it shows that this small blog is just about important enough for google to erect a signpost for it ๐
One of the first commentators on this blog was Jon Peltier. Jon has probably done more to extend Excel’s charting capabilities that anybody else. Jimmy Peรฑa and Chandoo helped along the way. Here are some of the other biggies that I take inspiration from (the list definitely is not comprehensive):
John Walkenbach – www.spreadsheetpage.com
Debra Dalgleish – www.contextures.com
Kaiser – www.junkcharts.typepad.com
Amanda Cox (New York Times)- www.nytimes.com (Amanda if you ever get to read this, a BIG thank you. For those who haven’t heard the name before, let me put it this way – Amanda Cox is a visualization rock star.)
MSDN Team Blog – www.blogs.msdn.com
OZGrid – www.ozgrid.com
MrExcel – www.mrexcel.com/forum/
BonaVistaSystems – www.bonavistasystems.com
..But The Most Important Of All … YOU …
You made this blog come so far. Thank you for reading this blog and your comments and your time. Without your help this wouldn’t have been anywhere near what it has been. You are the greatest source of inspiration for this blog and for all your loving care and affection …
Please keep the comments and the emails rolling in. I hope 2010 turns out to be great for this planet and all of us on it.
Updates
This blog will feature more of Excel 2010 this year than the prior. Excel 2003 still remains my weapon of choice. (I wish Microsoft gives serious thought to adding back the classic menu toolbar and I would be happy if they have it done by the time 2010 beta becomes alpha.)
Also launched recently launched ws the Treemap Add-In Utility for Excel which happens to be the first commercial product from this blog. It helps you create treemaps from within Excel. It’s fast, easy to use and works well even with thousands of data points. You can check out the latest demo version here.
If you would like to write a guest post, change anything on this blog or anything to be covered – I’ll be more than happy to oblige. You can write to me at databison |at the rate| gmail.com.
So till the next post … adiรณs
Hi Ajay… Congratulations on finding good readership and encouragement thru this blog. You have unique ability to come up with really good charting tutorials and alternatives. I visit regularly to learn new things. (A square bubble heatmap chart, who would have thought.. ?!?)
I wish you even more success and prosperity in the coming years.
(One small suggestion, I am not sure if I have the wrong feed, but your feeds only show an excerpt in google reader. It might be better to have full content available to feed subscribers as well. )
January 8th, 2010 at 4:56 amThanks ? For what? I’ve had a great time reading your posts. Keep going strong and all the best !!!
January 8th, 2010 at 1:17 pmThanks to you for your so excellent site. Hope we keep getting many of your great post!!!!!
January 8th, 2010 at 4:02 pmCongratulations on successfully growing your blog, Ajay. And thanks for the mention!
January 8th, 2010 at 5:07 pmThanks for the link love, keep up the great work! The blog theme is a visualization in itself. ๐
January 8th, 2010 at 8:36 pm@All – Thank you so much. Ok I agree to write for another year but only because you said so 8)
January 8th, 2010 at 11:02 pmA bigger thanks to you. Its guys like you that offer such valuable tutorials free of charge and we become overnight stars at work.
January 9th, 2010 at 10:59 pmKeep them coming Ajay. Congrats!
@chrisham – Thank you ๐
January 10th, 2010 at 12:00 amI love your post. Keep up these great posts.
January 13th, 2010 at 9:26 am@Tom – Thank you ๐
January 13th, 2010 at 3:58 pmI started going to this site last week….and I can’t stop coming back. I love the way each design is explained and most importantly the way that you provide the excel file.
Awesome…..keep up the great work!
January 14th, 2010 at 7:43 am@Cal – Thank you ๐
January 14th, 2010 at 12:47 pm