(last edited on April 29, 2014 at 1:26 am)
The power of the human voice is such that when someone called me up to ask me about the 2009 version of the Compact Calendar, I was so moved that I actually got off my butt to make it. Easier said than done; I said it would take about 15 minutes + about an hour to post. Four hours later, I’m finally done with tweaking, testing, download testing, virus scanning, packaging, and updating. It takes a bit of work to make sure these archives are clean…hopefully I didn’t miss anything. I almost posted a version that was off by one day…close call!
What Is It?
The Compact Calendar is my impromptu planning calendar, designed to be printed on paper from Excel. Print a bunch of these sheets out; it’s great for bringing to a meeting and sketching out a schedule on-the-fly. I keep a supply on hand when I’m actively out in the field. Unlike other calendars, it represents the months as a solid “bar of time”, which makes it easier to visualize how much time you really have. Plus, it just looks neat.
You can read more about the use and design of the Compact Calendar on the Compact Calendar Page.
What’s New
I finally have a version that will update the entire calendar when you change the year field at the top of the spreadsheet, based on the work of Todd Foster. So now, it’s super easy to make new versions of the calendar yourself for any arbitrary year. Just remember to update the Holiday Table.
“Jenny” and Jim Service both submitted techniques for handling the automatic month labeling on the left side, and I’ve incorporated it.
There have been several other modifications submitted to me over the year, and I’ve tried to pick the ones that are simple to maintain (e.g. they don’t require additional Excel modules, or tricky hidden extra columns). Thanks everyone for your submissions!
Check It Out
You can download the 2009 version at the regular Compact Calendar Page. I have only updated the US version; the international versions are handled by independent bloggers and are not under my control at all. I just link to them!
You’ll need Office 1997 or later to open the Excel Templates. Personally I have been using Office 2007, so there may be some issues with earlier versions of Office that I don’t know about. Please leave a comment if you come across anything. For users of non-Office productivity suites, good luck!
13 Comments
Hooray! Thanks for putting this up! (And thanks to the person who called you.)
Hi David,
The new version of your Compact Calendar looks great. A couple of weeks ago a I released a state-by-state version for Australian based on the 2008 compact calendar – mainly due to questions from 2008 users asking when the 2009 would be available. They are here http://workingsolo.com.au/2008/2009-australian-compact-calendar-2/
Thanks again for your great work with these personal productivity tools.
I love the improvements you made in the new version. Unfortunately I already produced the calendars for 2009 of the Spanish speaking countries (Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Spain, Guatemala, Mexico and Peru) which can be downloaded from http://canasto.es/calendario-compacto/, but when I have the time I will update them to the new version as well.
Hi David,
Thanks for this great calendar. If you switch the both formulas for the format, then a public holiday will be highlighted too, when it’s on the first of the month.
Leah, Jeroen: Awesome, I’ll update my links!
Tobimahony: Thanks for the suggestion! I actually wanted to make sure that the first of the month was highlighted before the holiday, because they are important “beginning of month” markers. In Excel 2007 you can have multiple conditional formats run, but previous versions will stop after hitting the first one. Although I’m trying to keep my support burden as low as possible, I may have to release Excel 2007 versions as well just for that feature.
David, you didn’t happen to be in San Jose recently did you?
I usually visit your site once a day, to see if you’ve updated. This started a few months ago when you were blogging consecutively. Seeing as this has changed, I know that I don’t like it, but I was also wondering how your sites traffic was doing. When a blog is put on hiatus it usually looses a lot of traffic, and frequent users, I am still hoping you’ll start up blogging again on a regular basis since I’ve liked reading your posts so much, but I am not like a lot of people. So how did less frequent updates effect the use of your blog?
Thanks.
Gary: I actually was there last week, but didn’t have time to really socialize. Did you see me?
Doub: My site’s traffic is actually about the same, holding around an average of 3000-3500 pageviews a day during the week, and about 2000-2500 during the weekend. Most of it is traffic coming in through other sites, and some of it (around 30%) is organic search.
I really hate not blogging, but I have had to put my attention on things going on here at home and also the major project I’m on, which continues to require my attention. It’s likely I won’t be done with this until next year, at which point I will want to relaunch and focus more on my own writing and product development.
yea I thought I saw you at Barnes and Nobles on San Tomas. I thought it was you since I had only seen you in pictures.
Looking back on it I should have said something. There’s always next time, or maybe not. Hopefully you’ll post something next time you’re in town.
yep I thought i saw you at barnes and nobles bookstore on San Tomas, but I wasn’t sure if it was you. I asked anyways. :p
Seems like your Canada Calendar points to a German link. My German isn’t enough to recognize if a Canadian Calendar is in there. Is it?
Gary: That definitely was not me :-) I typically hang around The Pruneyard in Campbell if I’m taking a quick break by myself.
Daryn: Ooops! Fixed! :-)
When a blog is put on hiatus it usually looses a lot of traffic, and frequent users, I am still hoping you’ll start up blogging again on a regular basis since I’ve liked reading your posts so much, but I am not like a lot of people. So how did less frequent updates effect the use of your blog?