Welcome To Josh's Blog O' Thoughts: Blog News

Earlier this month, I released version 2.0 of my NCAA basketball tournament bracket spreadsheet. The v2.0 update contained the functionality to grant bonus points for correctly choosing an upset win.

Unfortunately, it has been called to my attention that there is a bug related to the bonus point calculations in the Excel version of the file. I created the sheet in OpenOffice and then exported to Excel format. Apparently one of the formulas I was using worked a little differently in OpenOffice than in Excel. I have since corrected the file and updated it to v2.1. Please go to the original post to download the update. Please DO NOT use the v2.0 file which was available from Mar 12, 2010 - Mar 20, 2010.

How To Fix The Problem If You Are Already Using the v2.0 File For Your 2010 Pool

If you downloaded the v2.0 EXCEL file (OpenOffice file is fine) between Mar 12 and Mar 20, 2010, are currently using that file to run your pool, and are using the bonus points feature, you will probably want to run the following fix to correct the problem.

Instructions for fix:
1. Download this file: Fix_Excel_Bonus_Points.xls
2. Open the Fix_Excel_Bonus_Points.xls file
3. Go to Tools->Macros->Security and set macro security to Low.
4. Open your master bracket file.
5. Go to Tools->Macros->Macros
6. In the Macros In box near the bottom of the screen, make sure All Open Workbooks is selected.
7. Select the macro Fix_Excel_Bonus_Points.xls!Fix_Excel_Bonus_Calc
8. Click Run
9. Wait for message box saying Done
10. Save master bracket file
11. Close both files.
12. Your master bracket file should now be updated with corrected formulas for bonus point calculation.


Next year, download and use the fixed v2.1 file.


I apologize for the error. Hope you still can find the file useful.

I have updated my original bracket spreadsheet post to include sheets pre-filled with the 2010 field of teams. To download the 2010 bracket or the blank template spreadsheet, go to http://josh.breittechnologies.com/blog/2009_03_13_NCAA_Basketball_Tournament_Bracket_Spreadsheet_File

Last year my NCAA basketball tournament spreadsheet was quite a hit. To make it even more popular, I have added the ability to score bonus points for upsets. Bonus points can be awarded based on the difference in seeds between the winning and losing team. If an "underdog" team wins, you can give whatever amount of bonus points you want depending on how much of an underdog they were (a 16 beating a 1 deserves more bonus points than a 9 beating an 8).

See the instructions in the original post and in the spreadsheet file for more details.

http://josh.breittechnologies.com/blog/2009_03_13_NCAA_Basketball_Tournament_Bracket_Spreadsheet_File

That someone is me. This is possibly the longest I've gone without posting a new article since I started blogging a few years ago. I'm going to blame it on the fact that I started a new job back in May and have been focusing pretty heavily on that learning curve.

I hope to get back into blogging to provide you with more of my ever so "useful" bits of information.

Thanks for hanging in there.

During the month of March 2009, my blog set a new personal readership record. Due to a few high-volume blog articles (NCAA Basketball Tournament Bracket Spreadsheet File and Tax Reporting For Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP)), my blog saw over 2000 unique visitors last month. The previous record was just under 1000 unique visitors, so this was quite a feat.

Obviously, both of those articles are about seasonal topics, so I would imagine the readership would recede again once their time of year is over.

But just wanted to say thanks for reading (and commenting)!

Well in the past few days, one of my blog posts has made the distinct honor of being the first to have over 2000 views. Which of my popular posts was it to break this mark?

Was it the Gerber Viper Toilet Demonstration Video which linked to the very informative and sometimes slightly disgusting toilet demostration?

Was it the Tax Reporting For Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP) post helping people figure out how to report gains and losses from their ESPP plans?

Was it the Gerber Allerton Toilet Review which was my own personal review of the Gerber Allerton toilet?

Or was it the The Easy Guide To The Digital TV (DTV) Switchover post which attemps to help people understand the conversion to DTV in layman's terms?


AND THE WINNER IS...

Tax Reporting For Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP)

Granted, I this is a topic of seasonal interest. Last year, it got very high views in Febraruary, March, and early April, but it slumped off during the rest of the year. I assume I'll see the same thing happen this year as tax time comes to an end.

I just wanted to thank all of my readers for making August 2008 a statistical record for my blog. In August, this blog had 796 unique visitors. This is a puny amount compared to major sites, but it means to me that there are almost 800 people out there that have some interest in the things I have to say.

Leading the way during the month of August were the following articles:

Is This Hunging Of Fishing? - Information about Asian carp and a link to a video of fisherman/hunters bow hunting for them.

Gerber Viper Toilet Demonstration Video - Links to a demonstration video of the Gerber Viper toilet.

Gerber Allerton Toilet Review - My thoughts on the Gerber Allerton toilet after having used it for a few months.

Tax Reporting For Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP) - My explanation of how to record your capital gains from ESPPs.

2008 Beijing Olympics TV Coverage Spreadsheet - This was my spreadsheet of NBC's 2008 Olympic coverage. Too bad it's not of much use anymore.

Anyway, thanks for reading, and please feel free to comment on any articles that spark your interest.

Since I missed it in January, I thought I'd go ahead and post the list of the most popular posts in 2007. So here they are:

1. Is This Hunting Or Fishing? - Contains link to a video of people bow hunting for Asian Carp. Also includes some information on the problems created by this invasive species.

2. What? Worms Are Bad For The Ground? - Information about invasive species of earthworms and how they can damage forest vegetation.

3. Pay-Per-Channel Television Service - My musings on how great it would be if cable/dish providers would allow us to choose only the channels we wanted and then charge us for just those channels.

4. Are The Sun's Rays Weaker? - Questioning the ability of the sun to burn us due to the carbon-laden air. The resulting comments are very informative.

5. Chris Dodd Might As Well Give Up - I hate to say it Chris, but I was right. You lasted little longer than 1 or 2 caucuses/primaries and what do you have to show for it? A bunch of wasted time, money, and resources. You were never a contender.

Well, there you have the top 5 of 2007. Enjoy.

Well I wasn't really on vacation, but I did take the entire month of January off from blogging to take care of my affairs. Namely, moving in to our new house (expect a posting soon on some of the details). With my computer packed up in boxes for a good amount of time, I felt it was easiest to just let the blog slide for a few weeks.

Well rest assured, I am back and I do plan on posting more material very soon. Thanks to those of you who have continued to check this blog during the drought.

Some people may have noticed that there have not been many posts here in the past couple of weeks. Well, I just want to let my readers know that this blog is certainly NOT dead.

It just so happens that I have been extremely busy right now and have not had much time to make posts. I had a week long business trip to Orlando a couple weeks ago. Florida was very nice this time of year. If you find yourself in Orlando, I recommend going to Cocoa Beach on the Atlantic coast. Very nice beach and only about and hour drive.

In addition to my business trip, there have been many many decisions for our new house that have all come up at the same time. We've been spending a lot of our time trying to get these all figured out while at the same time prepping our current house to be put on the market.

All in all, it's been a very busy time for me, but I promise, there will be posts coming shortly.