It’s time for another Excel giveaway! Hallowe’en is just around the corner, so let’s find out what Excel Nerds do to celebrate. I’ve been given some awesome Excel utilities, books, and ebooks to give away, so let’s have some fun. Rules are at the end of this article.

To enter, write an original (and suitable for work!) comment below, describing either:

• A) an Excel related costume (real or imagined). For example, here’s a picture of my daughter and son, many years ago, ready for some trick-or-treating. My daughter was dressed as The Formula Doctor and my son was an early prototype of an Excel Web app. I’m sure they won’t mind me posting this picture, but if you see them, maybe you shouldn’t mention it.

OR

• B) your scariest Excel related experience. I’m sure you’ve had horrifying days, buried under spreadsheets, and workbooks that come back to haunt you. Tell the other readers about one of those gruesome times. Remember, misery loves company. We’ll feel sorry for you, as soon as we stop laughing.

The submission deadline is 12:00 noon (Eastern Daylight Time) on Tuesday, October 27, 2009. Winners will be announced here on October 28th.

Note: You can make as many comments as you like, but only the first one will count as your entry.

The Ghastly Goodies

Some scarily smart Excel authors, developers and publishers have contributed a monstrous mound of books and utilities for me to give away as treats.

Thanks to all the contributors – Patrick “Ogre” O’Beirne, Jan Karel “The Creeper” Pieterse, Charley “Crypt-Kicker” Kyd, John “Walking Dead” Walkenbach, Jon “Petrifier” Peltier, “Chiller” Chandoo and Matt “Killer” Kennedy.

Systems Modelling Ltd

From Patrick O’Beirne of Systems Modelling Ltd

• one copy of XLTest: Spreadsheet testing and auditing add-in — “XLTest helps you to check the integrity of your spreadsheets far more quickly than with tedious cell-by-cell inspection.”

JKP Application Development Services

From Jan Karel Pieterse, of JKP Application Development Services:

• one copy of Professional Excel Development, 2nd Edition
• one copy of Excel 2007 VBA Programming For Dummies
• one USB key (1 GB) with a set of tools like Name Manager and a free RefTreeAnalyser license (1 copy of this prize is available)

ExcelUser, Inc.

From Charley Kyd of ExcelUser, Inc.

• one copy of IncSight® DB: Excel Dashboard Templates Linked to Data — “Set up your first Excel dashboard report in less than an hour. Add any number of reports. You can update your reports in seconds because they’re linked to an Excel database.”
• The winner can select one of the two versions available:
  • IncSight® DB for Excel 2007
  • IncSight® DB for Excel 2003

J-Walk & Associates, Inc.

From John Walkenbach of J-Walk & Associates, Inc.

• one copy of the Power Utility Pak (PUP). — “Power Utility Pak Version 6 (PUP v6) is a useful collection of add-ins that brings significant new functionality to Excel. When PUP is installed, you can do things with Excel that you never thought were possible.”
• The winner can select one of the two versions available:
  • Power Utility Pak v6 for Excel 2000, Excel 2002 and Excel 2003
  • Power Utility Pak v7 for Excel 2007

Peltier Technical Services

From Jon Peltier, of Peltier Technical Services:

• one copy of a PTS Charting Utility – “When installed the utilities provide buttons on the Excel menu or ribbon that allow you to select a regular worksheet range and create a specialized and customized Excel chart.”
• The winner can select one from the following:
  • PTS Waterfall Chart Utility
  • PTS Box and Whisker Chart Utility
  • PTS Cluster Stack Utility
  • PTS Marimekko Chart Utility
  • PTS Dot Plot Utility

Pointy Haired Dilbert

From Chandoo of Pointy Haired Dilbert

• one copy of the newly released Project Management Bundle of templates for Excel — “The bundle contains 24 highly reusable excel templates for project planning, task management, timesheets, issue tracking, risk logging, status reporting and more.”
• The winner can select one of the two versions available:
  • Project Management Bundle for Excel 2007
  • Project Management Bundle for Excel 2003

Apress Publishers

From Matt Kennedy of Apress, 2 prizes – e-books that you can download from the Apress website:

• Pro Excel 2007 VBA, by Jim DeMarco (e-book)
• Pro Excel Financial Modeling: Building Models for Technology Startups, by Tom Y. Sawyer (e-book)

Contextures

And finally, from Contextures – 3 prizes. The 3 winners can each select one of my pivot table books:

• Beginning Pivot Tables in Excel 2007
• Excel 2007 PivotTables Recipes
• Excel Pivot Tables Recipe Book

The Rigid Rules

• To enter, submit an original (and suitable for work!) comment below, describing either an Excel-related costume or horrifying Excel-related experience
• The comment must be submitted before the deadline of 12:00 noon (Eastern Daylight Time) on Tuesday, October 27, 2009
• One entry per person – any additional entries will be deleted from the draw
• A random draw will select each prize and its winner. No substitution of prizes.
• Winners will be notified by email, so please provide a valid email address. This will not be publicly visible, but may be shared with the contest sponsors, so they can contact prize winners to arrange delivery.
• Physical prizes will be shipped, postage paid, but taxes or other charges (if any) will be the responsibility of the recipient.

______________

a2a_linkname="Very Scary Fall Giveaway For Excel Nerds"; a2a_linkurl="http://blog.contextures.com/archives/2009/10/21/very-scary-fall-giveaway-for-excel-nerds/";