I’ve been looking at the Mozilla Open Badges initiative lately, as a way to improve engagement with a particular site or Blog. My idea is that you could assign a set of earnable badges to a […]
Real Angry Birds In the toy store yesterday, I came across something odd. Physical games based on virtual ones. We all know how to play Angry Birds on our smartphones, Ipads etc – but here […]
I’m finding this ability to embed prettified source code a google site gadget or iframe really useful. The other day I added the ability to get and publish source code directly from a url (in […]
If you’ve been following the various posts about publishing source code from gists, google apps script, scriptdb and so on, you may have realizes there was one missing link. Publishing source code direct from a […]
It’s been a while since I played around with d3.js. Previously I’ve covered Sankey diagrams, trees, force diagrams and a few others – all straight out of excel. A couple of suggestions on the Google […]
I posted how to include and prettify snippets from GAS, Gist, and scriptDB the other day, adding the ability to select particular functions from within modules. See the Excel liberation site for more detail. With Google Apps Script, […]
In publishing gists and publishing Google Apps Scripts I showed how to prettify and embed snippets in web sites, blogs and so on. However, one last requirement is to be able to publish only particular functions. Although […]
The other day, I showed how to prettify Google Apps Script snippets and scriptDB contents, include them in web sites, blogs and google sites, and encode them in jSon and jSonP using the GAS content […]
When working with spreadsheet data, I always use sheet caching – a class in the mcpher library. This gives great performance improvements and simplification for processing Sheet Data and other attributes. You can use it […]
Usually on this blog and the associated site I cover topics to do with getting data in an out of Excel. Lately though, I’ve been playing around with using Google Apps Script as a proxy and […]
In a previous post I showed how Google Apps Script could return the contents of a script as Json so you could format that for including script samples on web sites. Today, here is how […]
GAS just keeps getting better. I was thinking the other day about how I might be able to embed sample Google Apps Script code in Google Sites, or other web sites in the way that […]
Excel liberation is all about being able to step outside Excel, whether it’s getting public data, integrating with other platforms or in the case of today’s post, interacting with and delegating processing to the cloud on […]
I don’t know about you, but I have trouble keeping all my various Google Apps Script shortcuts and keys (links to workbooks, links to content service queries, library keys and so on) under control and […]
In the builtwith.com api rest library entry for Excel I covered how to get data about a given web site using the builtwith.com API. I went against my usual rule here, by including an api that […]
I came across a great site, builtwith.com, that shows the technology being used in a given web site. You can also take a look and see the usage of various specific technologies over time. Now, […]
In Google Caching and faking jsonP, i showed how to use google cache to avoid multiple calls to the same json data. One of things i discovered was that the key value in google cache […]
In using Google Apps Script as a jSONP proxy, I covered how you could use GAS to get over javaScript same domain restrictions. If you need to access jSon data from javaScript, jQuery and so […]
Enterprise Architects often like to refer to Winchester Mystery House as an example of what you get if you build something with no plan, blueprint or end game in sight. This is a house with windows opening […]
In plotting functions in Excel I showed how to create plots from equations without needing to create a data table. Using the same template, here is the Excel version of the well known Batman Plot. Using […]
Roberto Mensa share this post today on G+, reminding me about the Google instant graph capability, and of course I wondered if the same thing could be achieved in Excel. Excel doesn’t really know how to […]
I’ve been messing around with the google Drive API lately, and haven’t really found out how to use it to host images for web sites satisfactorily. That was one of the things that prompted this […]
Continuing the theme of using Google Apps Script Content service and scriptDB for lots of things, today’s post cover a few tricky topics. How to convert an image to a blob so it can be […]
Creating d3.js tree diagrams directly from Excel, shows how to take a simple list of Excel data and create d3.js diagram that looks like this, I had a question on the Excel Liberation forum the […]
Lately I’ve been posting about the Google Apps Script Content Service and how to use it as a ‘serverless’ Rest API service. In addition, I covered how to use the ScriptDB as a secure repository for […]
Today I’m going completely off topic. I was fascinated by a G+ plus by John Walkenbach where he referred to this gizmodo post. This was about how people used to mail recorded message tapes to each […]
Today’s entry is pretty cool. I came across the urbarama site, which describes itself as “a collaborative world atlas of architecture and civil infrastructure”. What’s more it has an API, which will return details on […]
All of you who run a web site or a blog will probably be able to relate to this. The first month you see a drop in visits. It happened to me for the first […]
In scraping the scraper I showed how to get scraperwiki data into both Excel and Google Apps Script. More interestingly though, I was talking about data for which others had already done the legwork to create […]
oAuth arghhh.. When I was looking around for a way to easily implement oAuth, and be able to use it from multiple scripts, or even languages (I was originally trying to figure out how to […]
In various posts and articles I’ve been exploring uses of the Google Apps scriptDB datastore. One of the things I’ve been mulling over is how to simplify the whole oAuth experience when dealing with REST queries that need […]
In this post about using the scraperwiki API I covered how to get a list of publicly available scraperWiki data straight into Excel and Google Apps Script. Now you can get the associated data too with just […]
ScraperWiki API I’ve been taking a look at scraperWiki lately. In case you haven’t come across it, it’s a framework to allow you to scrape structured data from web sites using various data manipulation tools and code. […]
In messing around with scriptDB, I covered some usages of scriptDB when it first came out, along with a method of siloing data to keep it organized. Here’s a usage that might be useful for […]
Google currency API Lately for this spot I’ve been selecting APIs that are out of the ordinary, and which allow me to incrementally improve the capability of the REST library. The wrinkle today is that […]
Geo code from ip and host names Today’s API is a straightforward query per row, meaning that data is retrieved from the API using the contents of a column as the query. In this case […]
Get rxNorm drug data into Excel and Google Apps Script Aside from being a little specialized, today’s API is another quite unusual one. Normally apis allow you select the format of the output through a […]
Unlike Google Apps Script, which has a fine cloud based library capability, sharing and keeping code current for non-professional developers who use VBA is challenging. The use of add-ins for finished products with specific capabilities […]
Random Neil deGrasse Tyson quotes There’s probably no practical use to today’s API of the day, except that I am always amused by what he has to say. The other thing I wanted to look […]
Geocode and get administrative details and geoHash link from a UK postcode directly into an Excel or Google Spreadsheet Following on from the Yahoo GeoCode entry here’s another geoCoder – this time using UK post […]
On this blog, and on the ramblings site there is a growing number of code samples, but of course as things evolve, they get out of date. I started to write something to embed Gist samples in […]
In Starter implementation of R-melt for Excel I introduced a one liner in Excel/VBA to transform this into this You could consider this to be a kind of un-pivot – exploding tabulated data back into transactional […]
I came across ifttt.com (if THIS then THAT) the other day. Essentially it’s a simple way creating a trigger based on some event such as tweet mentioning you, or a facebook upload (THIS) and so […]
You have probably read that jSon works well with javaScript because ‘it is javaScript syntax’. Consider this javaScript (actually Google Apps Script). var items = {itema:1,itemb:’b’}; Logger.log (items.itema + “,” + items.itemb); We […]
Shorten URL API directly into an Excel or Google Spreadsheet Today’s API is from “ttb.li” which is a url shortening service. This is a query by row API, populating columns in a spreadsheet row using […]
Geocode with Yahoo API directly into an Excel or Google Spreadsheet Strictly speaking today’s API doesn’t really qualify as ‘API of the day’, since I’ve written about this before comparing a few geoCoding APIs. I’ve […]
In passing arguments in VBA using jSON I covered how you could use javaScript Object syntax to pass complex arguments to VBA procedures. Today I’ll cover how to pass complex arguments where there are optional values. […]
Data from CrunchBase API directly into an Excel or Google Spreadsheet Today’s API is another query type from “crunchbase” which is a free database of corporations, people and investors. Yesterday I showed you how to get […]
Data from CrunchBase API directly into an Excel or Google Spreadsheet Today’s API is from “crunchbase” which is a free database of corporations, people and investors. There are a number of types of query available in […]
Today’s API is “FAA airport status” – a dataSet query API, populating rows in a spreadsheet using the Airport IATA code as a key Here’s the Excel code (included in cDataSet.xlsm downloadable from the ramblings site) Public […]
In various posts such as this one, I’ve covered new entries to the REST library but it’s been kind of haphazard. Since I’m adding these regularly I figured I’d make a quick post like this for […]
Going back to the theme of ‘doing complicated things in one line of code’, here’s a mash up of cDataSet, Color Ramps, Mapping and various other things. Lets say we want to create a thematic […]
I haven’t posted anything on new entries to the rest-excel-gas library for a while. As I mentioned in this post the library itself is available as a rest query. There have been quite a number of new APIs added […]
I just added a couple of things to cDataSet.xlsm and noticed that I had done this over 100 times. During the same time period, visits to https://ramblings.mcpher.com/ where this is hosted have gone like this The top […]
In a previous post I covered how to use the Google Apps Script ScriptDB as a database from which to serve jSON responses – without the need for a server. Of course you may need to […]
What no server? That’s right – you can serve up data from your Google Apps Script directly. In my post the other day, I showed how to use the Google Apps ScriptDB as a place to store […]
I’m taking a break from d3.js and playing around with the new Apps Script DB. Those of you who read these posts or follow the rambling site may know that I have been building up a library […]
I’ve recently started to use scoop.it to pull together updates from this blog and the related site, along with anything else I find interesting or useful. It really is a nice way to curate things to […]
I’ve written about d3.js force diagrams, mapping tweet sentiments, , d3.js trees, Sankey diagrams and various other stuff on the ramblings site all of which show how to create d3.js diagrams directly from simple Excel data. This is settling […]
I noticed this morning that Huffington post released a REST API exposing all their polling results. I’ve added that to the Excel-Rest library so you can get the results of all their polls directly into […]
I’ve posted a few examples of d3.js lately, such as mapping tweet sentiments on a force diagram, d3.js tree diagrams, and sankey diagrams. I haven’t had a consistent approach to data structure so I thought […]
Mashing up capabilities I set myself a little challenge of pulling together a few different things I’ve been working on. From a list of queries, get associated tweets, along with their tweet sentiment rating using the Rest-Excel […]
Last week I posted how to create Sankey (flow) diagrams straight out of Excel. Let’s continue on that d3.js theme today with how to create d3.js tree diagrams straight out of Excel First of all […]
At last we can now create a library of useful stuff in GAS and access it (or share it) from other sheets. Those of you that have seen this blog or follow the parent web […]
On the ramblings site you can see how to create Google Maps straight from Excel, including adding circle overlays. By default, the code generated to plot these circles looks like this. if (sz) { […]
First of all thanks to Tony Hirst for blogging about this in the first place to put me on the track, and of course to Mike Bostok who created d3.js I figured it should not be too […]
As part of creating a framework for dual maintenance of Google Apps Script and VBA versions of the same application, one of the key things was to produce a set of functions in GAS that […]
In previous posts I covered a couple of conversions of Excel VBA projects to Google Apps Script, with particular emphasis on maintaining compatibility between the solutions to allow for dual maintenance. Previous conversions have been a GAS […]
Passing arguments in VBA can be a pain. Consider foo(a,,,,b,,,,c,e) Of course in some cases you can use named arguments, but the called function needs to know how to do that – it doesn’t work […]
In javaScript, everything is an object. Classes don’t really exist because they don’t have to. To create an class like structure, you just do something like this var employee = {}; employee[‘id’] = 1; employee[‘grade’] […]
I had some questions about authentication from users of the Excel Rest library. Typically Rest queries are authorized through the use of a developer key issued to registered users, but some sites need authorization as […]
I only recently became aware of Google Moderator. It’s a very simple tool to get sentiments on topics, ask questions, get suggestions and so on. If you have a Google Site, it’s very easy to […]
In a previous post I covered how to navigate REST responses using a simple treeview control as well as how to create a Treeview from any jSon object in a few lines of code. Recursion […]
If you open an Office Document, you might occassionally find your self with an error that tells you that your “object library is invalid” , “excel has had a catastrophic failure” or you have an […]
In a post the other day i covered how to use the scriptcontrol to call javaScript directly from VBA. Considering that javaScript has plenty of useful methods for manipulating arrays and strings and so on […]
Those of you that read this blog, and the ramblings site, will know that the topic content is about equally split between VBA and javaScript. Until today, I had no idea that there was a […]
Yesterday, I showed how to get all the f1 circuit names and locations using the Ergast API along with the Rest-Excel library. Now we have that data to play with, why not visualize them on […]
Thanks to Tony Hirst blog, where he demonstrates the Ergast API I have another entry to make in the Rest-Excel library. This time, it’s all the F1 races to start with, along with the possibility […]
If you are working with Google Apps Script, one of your priorities is definitely going to be a simple timer. Everything takes longer than you are used to, and you have to be very careful […]
I got this idea from Tony Hirst’s great blog. The OpenCorporates API gives rich information many companies. Using Google Refine to reconcile, it cleans up many sources of data to a queryable datasource. So here […]
There are many Google Mapping Examples in the Excel and Maps Integration section of the Ramblings site. So much so that it can be quite hard to get started in a small way. There is […]
For those of you that have been following VBA to Google Apps Script, here is another one. This time, it’s a conversion of the Excel color ramp library. You can download the code for and […]
Today’s post is about how to use the jSon to treeView capability in a previous post, and apply it to explore results returned by Rest- Excel library. The library, itself a jSon structure, is visualized […]
Back to the theme of ‘do it in one line’ today. Thinking about some the jSon – Excel capabilities on the ramblings site , and the structure of the cJobject class in which they are […]
On the ramblings site, you will find lots of downloadable examples and explanations dealing with connecting Excel to Google Maps and Earth. Following numerous requests on our forum, here’s how to filter google markers according […]
Conversion effort A few weeks ago I wrote about starting my effort to convert a complex VBA project to Google Apps Script. I vaguely remember thinking at the time that this was going to be […]
In a previous post, I introduced the concept of local caching of Google Docs Spreadsheet Values to be able to optimize Google Apps Script without needing to change the structure of your code. This gave […]
It’s well known that reading all the values at once from a Google Spreadsheet is much more efficient than doing it one by one. You can work round this if you are starting from scratch, […]
Lets say you have an Excel workbook consisting of tabs, all in the same format, that various people completed. You want to copy them all to a consolidated sheet from time to time so you […]
You are ready to move to the cloud, but what about all those legacy vba apps? Are they really going to influence your decision such that you have to stay where you are? Moving to […]
Color Ramps In a previous post, I showed how to automate the\ creation of a heatmap in Excel. It occurred to me that this could be generalized to any color ramp. Here is an extensible […]
tagCloud in Outlook In a previous example, I showed how to create a tagCloud of various Excel data sources, with a downloadable example on the ramblings web site It occurred to me it would be pretty […]
The tagCloud class Today’s post will demonstrate how to generate tagClouds from various sources in Excel. As an example we will use some tweets retrieved by the rest- Excel library A ‘Mitt Romney’ type query generates this tagCloud […]
Combining multiple rest queries in a single Worksheet In previous posts, I covered how to get tweetsentiments into excel and how to get Google Finance data into Excel. Today we’ll look at how to build an application […]
Today’s post is about how to create a palette to use for a heatmap, and how to apply it to either an Excel Table of values to be compared, or to create surface chart and […]
Abstracting an Excel data source. In almost of all of the downloadable examples on the ramblings web site, I use a set of data abstraction classes to separate workbook data from its workbook location, and […]
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