Whenever I make major changes to the layout, I like to put a post out there so you have an easy way to comment on it. You can always send an email too. You may notice that I’ve made some changes to the menu (sidebar). Namely,

• Recent “x” lists are now javascript expandable lists
• Categories are now in a dropdown and alphabetical and hierarchical
• The archive list is gone and replaced with a link to an archive page

Expandable Lists

In style.css under the only theme I use, I added this

I copied the “ul ul” right above it because I wanted all the stuff to be the same, I just wanted a way to differentiate between menu lists that I wanted to hide and those I didn’t. The “display:none” line is the only difference between this and the one above it. All of this is based on the Gemini template.

Then in index.php, I added this between the already existing script tags. If you don’t have script tags you can but them within the head tags.

Then in rap div, I have this:

The function comes from Adrian Holovaty. It has too many arguments because I modified it from the original. I modified it because I never want an expanded list to shrink because another list is expanded.

By adding ‘class=”expand”‘ to the ul tag, I was able to choose which lists are expandable and which aren’t.

If you know anything about php and css, then you know that I don’t know anything. I’m happy to take your suggestions for the proper way to do this. If you don’t know anything, then assume this is the correct way at your own peril.

The Recent x lists are from Customizable Post Listings and Recent Comments/Recent Posts

Categories

The new categories dropdown is provided by Typedby.com.

Archives

I never use the date archives, so I’m happy that Jon pointed out that they suck. I’ve left the calendar part because it looks cool, but replaced the monthly listing with sortable archives provided by nicer-archives-for-wordpress. It looks pretty cool and I think will come in handy. I use the Search box almost exclusively. The Atomz search works really well and I can always find the post I want with a quick keyword search.

As always, tell me what you think. If I killed your favorite navigation method, be sure to speak up. We may be able to make a deal. With all this real estate savings the Google ads are now above the fold. I may be able to retire soon. Although I’m considering putting the search box up higher to get people to use it – it’s just that good.

Recently, I got this comment:

Dick,

Just browsing and I saw that Jason posted a link to a site that can unprotect projects.

[See the censored comment here]

I’m not sure if you edit/censor the comments, but I don’t like that site. (Yes, I’ve used it!)

But there are too many [Excel developers] who make their living with protected .xla projects.

Yours in censorship,

I hardly think it’s necessary to post the entire comment, but there were two things I loved about it: The admission that he’d used the site that he hates; and the closing “Yours in censorship”. They were just too funny not to share.

To answer the question, I’ve never censored a comment until this one. I want people, like Jason, to feel comfortable that they can comment on this site. Actually, I just don’t want the extra work of monitoring comments. Although I read them all, I don’t want to be the comment police.

I thought about this for a couple of days and I decided to remove the link that Jason provided. There’s no question that I am against people stealing other people’s work. There’s also no question that the method provided by the link could be used to do that. It could also be used to get at your own code for which you lost the password, a reason about which I have no objection. I don’t advocate the outlawing of CD-RWs because they may be used to steal music. So what’s the difference?

The difference is that I and other authors of this site are Excel developers. It is in our best interest that as few people as possible know how to crack code. If we were professional musicians, maybe we would be against CD-RWs. I’m not going to crusade to have that information removed from the internet, I simply choose not to spread it.

I imagine one or two of you has an opinion on this subject and I’d like to hear it. And to Jason: I’m sorry I censored you. I’m sure you meant nothing malicious and were only trying to help. You can call me a communist if you want (but nobody else can).

Every time it comes to Column Headings I struggle to get meaningful text into such a small box.

There are a few approaches I’ve used:

A little while ago I starting rotating the Column Heading text as a way to save space…

I’ve settled on a less extreme Text Orientation, like 30°.

But what is really great about Text Orientation is the way Vertical Borders react – they go angled too!

I think the borders really help to guide a user from the column heading the column values.

It would be interesting to know what you do when it comes to formatting headings… Click Comments and let us know!