Monthly Archives: March 2019

Power Query DATEDIF Function

I have been using Excel's DATEDIF function for years to determine the age of items in years, months, and days. I did not know that the function was unsupported and had issues until I ran into a bug last week. Because much of my personal work involves dates, I need to have an accurate age calculation function for use in Excel and Power Query. In this post, I will discuss a DATEIF workaround that I found online (Figure 1) and a Power Query age calculation function that I wrote based on a concept from Imke Feldmann. My workbook is available here for those who are interested. The workbook shows how I tested the routine by comparing it with the DATEDIF workaround results. I tested the boundary conditions and then random dates. The results agreed with the DATEDIF workaround of Figure 1 and an online date calculator. Continue reading

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Computing the Longest Lived US President with Power Query

I was listening to news the other night when I heard a reporter mention that Jimmy Carter just became the oldest US president in history. I thought verifying this fact would be a good Power Query exercise. He had just surpassed George H.W. Bush, the previous record holder. Continue reading

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Good Use for Excel Textjoin Command

One common Excel task is tracking work hours. As a contractor, I encounter all sorts of approaches to recording work hours. One small company wants all of my hours captured in an Excel workbook that contains one worksheet per week. Every two weeks, an administrator goes in and captures the hours into another worksheet. Continue reading

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