-------------------------Monitor------------------------ The Newsletter for PC-Based Data Acquisition and Control Issue 125 www.windmill.co.uk December 2008 --------------------ISSN 1472-0221---------------------- All at Windmill Software wish you a happy and peaceful New Year, and send our best wishes for 2009. I hope you find this 125th newsletter useful, but should you want to remove yourself from our mailing list please go to https://www.windmill.co.uk/newsletter.html CONTENTS ======== * Excel Corner * DAQ News Roundup * Data acquisition exhibitions ________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________ Excel Corner: Working with Alternate Rows ________________________________________________________ Using the MOD and ROW functions, you can tell Excel to perform tasks on data in every other row. MOD returns the remainder after a number is divided. It takes the form MOD(number,divisor). Using the divisor "2", you can tell whether a number is odd or even. ROW returns the row number of a cell reference. It takes the form ROW(reference). If no reference is given it uses the current row. You could, for example, shade alternate rows using conditional formatting and the MOD and the ROW functions. 1. Select your data. 2. On the Format menu, click Conditional Formatting. 3. Under Condition 1, select Formula Is. 4. In the data entry box, type =MOD(ROW(),2)=0. 5. Click the Format button. In the Format Cells dialogue box, click the Patterns tab. 6. Select a colour then click OK. 7. Click OK again in the Conditional Formatting box. The formula in step 4: =MOD(ROW(),2)=0, checks whether the row number divided by 2 has a remainder of 0. If this is true, the row is coloured in. If false the row is left as it is. You can use the MOD function to perform other tasks. You could add every other cell in a column for instance. To do this you could use the DSUM function. This adds a column of numbers in a "database". A database in Excel is like a range but the first row of each column must contain a column heading. DSUM is written as DSUM(database,field,criteria). Database is the range of cells making up the list or database. Field is the column being used: 1 for the first column, 2 for the second, etc. Criteria are the cells containing the conditions you specify. Criteria cannot be just the condition cell, but should also have a column heading. In this example, we want to add every other cell in column A. The Criteria column is column C. Cell C1 contains the heading "Criteria" (or any text you like). C2 contains the criteria itself, namely =MOD(ROW(A2),2)=0 This will give TRUE if the row is an even number and FALSE if an odd number. Column B is where the result will be written. It contains this DSUM: =DSUM($A:$c,1,$C$1:$C$2) DSUM will add up all the rows where the criteria specified gives a true result. That is, all the even rows. You could use this method to add up every nth row, by changing the 2 to a different number. You could achieve the same result by using an array formula, but this may slow the spreadsheet down. If one of the cells referenced in the formula changes: all the cells referenced will be recalculated. Related Topics: Data Acquisition in Excel https://www.windmill.co.uk/excel/ Working with Collections of Data in Excel https://www.windmill.co.uk/monitor116.html#Excel ________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________ DAQ News Roundup ________________________________________________________ Welcome to our roundup of the data acquisition and control news. If you would like to receive more timely DAQ news updates then grab our RSS newsfeed at https://www.windmillsoft.com/monitor.xml. Read https://www.windmill.co.uk/newsfeed.php for notes on how to display the news on your own web site, read it via e-mail, mobile phone or in your browser. Dolphin speed sorted There was something peculiar about dolphins that stumped zoologist Sir James Gray in 1936. He had observed the sea mammals swimming at a swift rate of more than 20 miles per hour, but his studies had concluded that the muscles of dolphins simply weren't strong enough to support those kinds of speeds. The conundrum came to be known as "Gray's Paradox." Now, using flow measurement technology, researchers have solved Gray's Paradox. Source: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute http://rpi.edu/ Self-sufficient sensors Researchers at the Fraunhofer Technology Group have successfully developed a transducer capable of creating electricity from the fluid movement of surrounding air or water. The technology could enable pressure monitor sensors to supply themselves with energy rather than rely on batteries or wiring. Source: Process Engineering http://www.processengineering.co.uk/ Painted on micro sensors Tiny radios embedded in paint could be used to pick up sound, detect whether wine or ice cream has been stored properly or even be painted on the heart to prevent arrhythmias. BAE Systems researchers have developed miniature wireless sensors that are powered by scavenging ambient radiation from the atmosphere. Source: The Engineer https://www.theengineer.co.uk/ Marine mammal detector There is increasing interest in the effect of man-made noise on marine life and consequently environmental impact assessments for offshore operations typically require both monitoring of radiated noise and passive acoustic monitoring. Ecologic Ltd have deployed a towed array sensor and a sophisticated suite of software, at a number of wind farm construction sites and, although primarily used to listen for vocalising mammals, the recordings made have also captured the noise radiated by the construction work. Characterisation of the Ecologic system for quantitative measurements over the range of frequencies generated by the piling operations has enabled these recordings to make a valuable contribution to the overall assessment of the radiated noise. Source: NPL http://www.npl.co.uk/server.php?show=ConWebDoc.2860 ________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________ Data Acquisition Exhibitions and Conferences ________________________________________________________ Every four months we list the forthcoming exhibitions around the world related to data acquisition and control. INTERNEPCON Japan 28-30 January Tokyo Japan Asia's largest exhibition of Electronics Manufacturing and SMT (surface mount technology). http://www.nepcon.jp/en/ Int'l Automotive Electronics Technology Expo 28-30 January Tokyo Japan International exhibition in Japan specialised in all kinds of automotive electronics technology. http://www.car-ele.jp/en/ PWB EXPO : Printed Wiring Boards Expo 28-30 January Tokyo Japan Exbibition featuring PCBs/PWBs, PCB materials, design tools and design and development services. aqua-therm Moscow 3-6 February Moscow Russia International exhibition for heating, ventilation, air-conditioning, water supply, sanitary equipment and environmental technology. http://www.aquatherm-moscow.com/ EIS Exhibition 24 February Silverstone Race Track UK Instrumentation, analysis and testing exhibition. http://www.e-i-s.org.uk/ Advanced Manufacturing UK 2009 25-26 March Birmingham UK Includes Mtec, machine building, automation and green manufacturing. http://www.mas.berr.gov.uk/ ________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________ * Copyright Windmill Software Ltd * Reprinting permitted with this notice included * For more articles see https://www.windmill.co.uk We are happy for you to copy and distribute this newsletter, and use extracts from it on your own web site or publication, providing the above notice is included and a link back to our website is in place. An archive of previous issues is at https://www.windmill.co.uk/newsletter.html and an index of articles at https://www.windmill.co.uk/newsletter.html Windmill Software Ltd, PO Box 58, North District Office, Manchester, M8 8QR, UK Telephone: +44 (0)161 834 6688 Facsimile: +44 (0)161 833 2190 E-mail: monitor@windmillsoft.com https://www.windmill.co.uk/ https://www.windmillsoft.com/
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