Author: Craig Holmes

Microsoft Office Master Instructor and owner of Raising the Bar. Formerly trained as an Aircraft Technician with the RAAF

10 Basic Tips For PhotoShop

10 basic tips for Photoshop CS5
10 basic tips for Photoshop CS5

A long time ago, my first business was editing photographs for professional photographers. During this time I picked up many useful time saving tips in Photoshop that I would like to share with you. Most of them are basic however they can really save you some time in Photoshop and I use these tips and tricks all the time. If your not a keyboard shortcut fan then you really should learn. Some features require you to use keyboard short cuts to get the job done. Read on – 10 basic tips for Photoshop.

Continue reading “10 Basic Tips For PhotoShop”

Excel VBA Selection and Navigation Techniques – part 2

Microsoft Excel VBA NavigationSee previous article: Excel VBA Selection and Navigation Techniques

In the last article I showed you how to make some basic navigation and selection techniques using the macro recorder. In this article I’ll show you how you can navigate and select when the data is more complex. Blank cells can be difficult to deal with if you don’t know how. I’ll take you through some of the methods I use when coding in Excel VBA. Continue reading “Excel VBA Selection and Navigation Techniques – part 2”

Excel VBA Selection and Navigation

Microsoft Excel VBA NavigationPeople often ask me about selection and navigation techniques using keyboard shortcuts when I’m teaching Macros in an Advanced Excel course. However, when I’m teaching students how to program for the first time in an Excel VBA course:

Question: How do I select or navigate using Excel VBA?

In this article I’m going to show you some basic techniques on how to go about it. Continue reading “Excel VBA Selection and Navigation”

Office Clipboard

[caption id="attachment_143" align="alignleft" width="152"]The Microsoft Office Clipboard The Microsoft Office Clipboard. Keyboard shortcut (Alt, H, F,O)[/caption]

How many times have you done it? You need to copy several things from one excel spreadsheet to another or from one word document to another or even from one Microsoft Office application to another, so you copy paste, copy paste…… copy paste. I think you get the point. Well let me introduce you to one of those tools that is now a little hidden however it’s a real little gem of a tool when you need to use it. It’s the office clipboard. No, not the normal windows clipboard.

The Microsoft Office Clipboard
The Microsoft Office Clipboard. Keyboard shortcut (Alt, H, F,O)

How many times have you done it? You need to copy several things from one excel spreadsheet to another or from one word document to another or even from one Microsoft Office application to another, so you copy paste, copy paste…… copy paste. I think you get the point. Well let me introduce you to one of those tools that is now a little hidden however it’s a real little gem of a tool when you need to use it. It’s the office clipboard. No, not the normal windows clipboard. Continue reading “Office Clipboard”

Database Management in Excel

Correct database heading locationWhen working with data in Excel it surprises me how many people don’t know how to setup a database (also known as a list or table) correctly. This can cause many problems when trying to sort, filter, subtotal, build pivot tables or utilising the table tool. I’ve seen first hand the devastating results of a user sorting only part of a database because the database wasn’t set up correctly and they didn’t know how to safely manage the data. Whether you enter the data directly into your database or you download the data from an external source I’m going to go through the design considerations that you need to apply when setting up your database. There are not many considerations however they are very important. Continue reading “Database Management in Excel”

Working with Dates in Excel

Working with dates in Excel
Working with dates in Excel

I’ve been a Microsoft Office Master Instructor for over 12 years now and I’ve seen some pretty silly things in Excel when it comes to working with dates. Most people don’t understand how dates are stored so they tend to do whatever it takes to get an answer to their problem. This result often leads to more work, heartache and pain further down the track or they simply just don’t get the right answer. In their eyes, ‘close enough is good enough’. Some of the Insidious, diabolical, mega formulas I’ve seen would leave mathematicians scratching their heads. Lets take a closer look at working with dates in Excel. Continue reading “Working with Dates in Excel”

SQL Esssentials – Level 2

Due to the success and feedback of our SQL Essentials course we have added another course to the public schedule – SQL Esssentials (Level 2). This course immediately continues on from the SQL Essentials course including some of these topics- Creating and Manipulating Tables, Using Views, Working with Stored Procedures, Using Transaction Processing, Using Cursors, Understanding Advanced SQL Features – more info

Microsoft Project Courses

Our previous Project 2010 courses was divided into two levels, Basic and Advanced. Although this has worked for us in the past we had a number of people telling us that they don’t use the resource and costing side of MS Project. This was normally due to a business requirement dealing with projects at a higher level than MS Project is capable of. For this very reason we have decided to break up the course into 2 halves. The first is dealing with tasking, linking, link relationships, task based reporting and the Gantt chart. So naturally we decided to call it: Project Essentials – Timeline and Tasks. The second course deals specifically with resources, overallocation of resources, costs and associated reporting. We’ve decided to call it: Project Advanced – Resource Management.

You can find more information on these courses here: Project Training Courses