Quick Tip – Flip Numbers From + To – (Or Vice Versa)

Posted on July 29th, 2011 in Excel,General,Office 2007,Office 2010 by Ken Puls

I was working with some budget stuff today and wanted to forecast that a range of accounts would be written off. I had a forecast that showed the projected transactions monthly, (all zeros as the projects have been discontinued,) and the projected year-end balance. So I basically wanted to take the projected year-end balances, flip them from positive to negative and stuff them in the July transaction column. Here’s how:

  • Copy the range of numbers
  • Right click the destination and choose PasteSpecial
  • Select Values and Subtract:

  • Say OK and voila:

Now interestingly enough, if there are values in the cells, it overwrites them. If there are formulas in the cells, it subtracts them from the formulas. Kind of odd that it isn’t consistent.

(And of course, if you subtract a negative number, it turns into a positive too.)

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Setting up Out Of Office replies on Outlook 2010

Posted on July 15th, 2011 in General,Office 2010 by Ken Puls

I love this! If you’re running Outlook 2010 and Exchange 2010, you can set up your out of office replies any time during the day, and schedule them to take effect for a certain period. I wish I could do this with my phone… that way I could set it up when I think about it, and then forget about it. Currently I have to set a reminder to change my greeting just before I leave for the day… something that I’ve forgotten in the past due to the inevitable last minute chaos that always erupts just before you’re planning to go away for a week!

At any rate, back to Outlook, here’s how:

  • Go to the File menu and click Automatic Replies
  • Check the radio button to send automatic replies
  • Check the checkbox to only send during the time range

I set mine up to take effect 5:00 on the day I’m leaving until 5:00 of the business day before I’m back. Just click OK and you’re done! No need to worry about remembering to do it just AFTER you shut your computer down.

In addition, you can also set up a different message for those outside the organization… (What you’re seeing above is the message to anyone inside my company.0 Click the “Outside My Organization” button and set up your message there. (Notice you can also opt not to respond to anyone externally.)

You might notice that I also dragged my return by a day for those outside the organization in this case. Gives me a bit of time to catch up on the internal stuff first.

This is pretty cool stuff, and a major improvement over earlier versions. I think it would be great if I could control the time range for external messages separately as well, but hey, I can live with this for now. J

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