Google Sheets And Why We Should Use Them.
No flannel, Today, I'm all about the short and sweet, succinct even. This morning has gone in a different direction as anticipated, so I though I would just get on it and share my thoughts about Google Sheets and why we should use them.
I could probably say the same about Google Docs but as yet I haven't had the pleasure.
I mean, you don't have to use them but they're there and they're free, so why not take advantage of them.
For those of you who are already using them, yay you.
You can access them by clicking on the icon, up in the top left corner. It's the same as the one below but will have 'Apps' next to it. My image would have had that on as well, except when I enlarged, it was way too pixelated.
One more image and then I'll get to the why, as I can see you all on the edge of your seats, waiting with barely contained excitement.
Once you have clicked on the icon you will get the following image or a variation on it.
Wow, that came out better than I was expecting, it looks proper professional, if I do say so myself.
As you can see, one of the pictures is entitled 'Sheets'. That's the one I'm on about. Basically it's a very user-friendly spreadsheet. No more, no less.
At one point, in my past, I could navigate round a spreadsheet in a way that made it look like I knew what I was doing. It was a long time ago and it seems that those relevant memory files have been deleted.
However, fast-forward to the modern (if not slightly dated) era. Now I have found a use and it is at a level that is manageable for my limited skill set.
Once you've clicked on the image, you'll be given the option to open a new, blank spreadsheet. When you do, it will look something like this.
Finally, we have arrived at the 'why'. Some of you may already be doing this, feel free to talk amongst yourselves during this part.
This morning, I wanted to do some 'housekeeping' (I remembered the word this time) before I started on anything else. Answering website comments and responding to some recent feedback that had been left for one of my sites.
Both of these reminded me that I needed to start going through all of my content and updating it. Some of it is well over a year old and I know it is going to be littered with mistakes and areas that could do with a 'make over'.
I wanted to go through each site and start with the very first article written on each one, then slowly work my way through chronologically. Keeping track of this could be messy, so I decided to use a spreadsheet.
This has many more advantages (most beyond my scope) but you can also keep a record of each post's images, which apparently makes it easier if you needed to compress them, so I've been told.
So with my best foot forward, I went to the first article. After correcting a plethora of grammatical errors and rewriting a decent amount, I updated the post and then copied the link address.
I then 'pasted' it into the spreadsheet. I also wrote 'Updated 10/05/2020' in the adjacent 'cell'. Just for the record, here it is.
There you have it. A permanent record of all the updates you have done.
I have already created a 'sheet' for all the WA posts and transferred the URL's on to it. This will also prove useful, should I ever want to repurpose that content. I can leave a note on each entry as to how I have re-used each post and when that was done.
There are many more uses and you will probably be able to think of others, I'm sure. Feel free to add them in the comments for everyone to utilise.
Hope you found this useful. Now I'm off to do the shopping. Deep joy. Stay safe, healthy and happy.
Twack Romero
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I use SHEETS for spreadsheet, I.e. Books I read (so I don't buy twice) xfer to iphone, when I was leasing a vehicle made a spread with the projected mileage at the end each month also xtrans to phone, use as a lock box for PW and so on. I use DOCs for things that I need often so that I don't have to retype, it is easy to get to.
You sound a lot more competent around spreadsheets than I am Edward. I'm sure the more I use them the better I'll get but for now, it's very basic.
I pretty much haven't created many spreadsheets either. Only used when somebody else would send me some data in that format.
I have a lot of text files with stuff I wanted to save. Like today. I have so many sites bookmarked that its sometimes hard to find what I'm looking for. I made a text file with the links to some sites I want to look at later.
That's a good idea, might have to borrow it. I ended up just putting all the links in one folder but, I now have no idea what's in there.
I give the files names that are descriptive of the types of links. I have one called wordp2see. It's all links to sites with wordpress info
At some point I will dedicate a morning or afternoon to going through them all and filing them in a similar manner. At the moment they're all in one folder called 'Useful sites'. It's just so easy to put them in there.
It's easy to bookmark them too but then you have to go through your whole list of bookmarks to find what you want
We could do with a lot of things. I am amazed that there is no spellcheck plugin for wordpress. That should be a feature that is a part of wordpress with no plugin needed.
After all, it's not rocket science. Except for me
The great thing about Google drive is that we can take the content that we create with us on the go. Each article that we create has a unique Url associated with it, one of the simplest ways to share content and bring value to the audiences that we are reaching out to.
Doing a spreadsheet of content created and posts of interest is an excellent way to manage content here in WA.
Good reminders, Twack.
I may have sn interest in trying to get some work as a freelance writer. Saving both the posts you write for your blog or blogs as well ad the posts on your WA blog is s giood way to build up your portfolio.
Does anybody know how to save WA blog posts to a storage outside of the WA platform?
Hi Neil, probably the easiest way and one that doesn't cost is to use Google docs in Google drive, just create folders and then create a new doc and just copy and paste your articles there, the cool thing is that you can sync them across all of your devices.
Best wishes with the freelancing a great way to create those transition opportunities.
I'm just looking into ways to make some money before my affiliate marketing starts to produce income.
Thank you Alex. It is definitely going to make life easier as I move forward, even if it is a kind of 'index' at the moment, it will become a place to record everything else to do with each post.
Another sheet tweaker, I should have known. Birds of a feather I guess. I tend not to trust cloud based computing, I prefer using stand alone programs. My favorite is Open Office. All you could want, and totally free. Did I mention that I like free? Wifey calls me cheap, I prefer to think I'm frugal.
Shrewd over frugal. I'm an advocat of Open Office and I still have it on one of these hard drives but my need for any type of 'officey' software, has somewhat diminished, until now.
Plus, if someone else can have it taking up space on their drives, I'm all for it.
One day I like to have a tour of a 'server farm'
That's true. Who knows if Google will start charging you to access what you already have in their cloud.
Of course with open office your computer could crash and it's all lost unless you have it backed up in somebody's cloud. Damned if you do and damned if you don't.
I've got it backed to my own personal cloud. 3 - 1TB HD's backed up very frequently. HD's not online except for back-up
That sounds like a good way to safe guard. On and off, I've been looking for an enclosure for my spare 'old' drives. I like the idea of the ones that include some form of 'RAID'. I'll get to it at some point.
Years ago, I was with a paid back up service. After a while, I asked myself why I was paying for something I could myself. Saved me a tidy sum over the years.
I have been using google drive for years. lots of music and videos The only give you 15 gigs but you can just add more gmail accounts.
I have a lot of music files there, I can listen either on computer or phone. I was putting videos there but I realized that most of them are on YouTube and I can watch them without having to store them.
Makes sense. I'm hoping to get organised enough to just have one hard drive for music and another for video. We use Plex, so the rest of the family can watch anything on the computer on the main tv.
I've also got a pair of little 250 gig HD's for music and video, the big guys are for data and such.
What happens if there is a fire or a flood? What if you are burglarized? There is not a single item of electronic equipment that I bought as recently as 5 years ago that still works? Want an old phone? I have a few. 5 laptops. The newest one I bought in 2016. Kaput. Back when portable digital music players first came out I bought one. I was the size of a hard drive and only 8 gigs. Paid $400 for it. Only way I could use it was too hook it to some kind of cassette looking thing and plug it into the cassette player in my truck. Remember those. They are probably in some junkyard with all the VCRs, flip phones and Sony Walkmans.
I have a couple of VCR's lying around (Still can't bring myself to get rid of the 650 videos) and about half a dozen phones, one day I'll get round to fixing them and putting them on Ebay, people love old tech.
Hopefully I'll sort myself out a 5 bay enclosure to do the same, it's on the list, I'll get to it.
I've got a couple of my brothers old home grown tapes still floating around the bunker. Bitter sweet to watch them on occasion, but I enjoy them none the less.
Now there's a thought. I've got mine kinda standing willy nilly about the computer. Thanks Twack
While the venerable 8 track hasn't been produced by the big labels since the late 80's, there are still folks out there creating them. Actually, there is kind of and underground for the 8 track folks. check out this link if you're interested.
https://8trackheaven.com/
Greg
Back in the day, I had 2 each beta and vcr. I was stationed over seas at the time and although we had AFRTS, armed forces radio and television, I lived a little off the beaten path and reception was almost nil, so I began renting and recording. I had quite a library built up. Wish I had kept all of those gems.
Sometimes something just works, whether it's popular or not. There's plenty of material that hasn't made its way onto digital format yet and might never, if there's no call for it, that's when those 'underground' ones come into their own.
True. Ok, here's one for you. It was about 12" diameter, analog not digital format. Remember what it was?
Those things only lasted for the blink of an eye. I didn't know anybody who bought one and I have never seen a movie in one.
I didn't own a player, but I did have the opportunity to watch movie recorded on laser disk. For the era, the audio/video was remarkably better than either VHS or Beta Max. It was a great idea for the time but difficult to market. Kind of pricey when compared to VHS/Beta. The format was large and video tapes were compact and easier to store. There were other marketing issues, but I think you get the idea.
Interesting question and a topic of long discussion better left to another time and place my friend. :-)
Wow Twack I had no idea that Google has this. I use Excel but still very useful to know.
And well done getting your housekeeping done.
Hope the weather is better in your part of the country than it is here. It’s horrendous - like a Winter’s day!
Thank you and you're very welcome.
It has been more 'Autumnal' here, with some proper windiness. Still, it can do as it pleases, I managed to mow the back lawn the other day, so I'm good to go for at least another two weeks.
To use excel you have to pay for Microsoft Office. Bill Gates already has enough of my money.
Ha! I started painting the fence yesterday. Got had the driveway and front done and planned to finish that part today 🙄
Ideal weather for painting, the wind dries it quickly, unless of course you're having rain as well, then it's just miserable.
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Thanks, Twack. I learned yet another helpful hint from you today. I have hunted for a free spreadsheet and never knew this existed
I went through each of my articles and put internal links in each post, recording the entries in a similar fashion as you did above. I have the link for the page, and the pages linked to & from that page recorded now. Thanks again for sharing.
Blessings
Linda
You're welcome Linda, sounds like you've taken it to the next level. What you're doing sounds like an excellent idea.