

MogBer - crush of gers
Heuristic for planning with Excel
Most people use Excel or Calc (libriOffice) only as a table calculation. But you can use these for a star logic table to refactor complex problems into a simple problems. The nature of the problems can be very diverse. You can estimate costs of complex websites or do the planning for the construction of an airport outside of Berlin.
I borrowed the idea of heuristics from the macro-economists. They use the heuristic implicit in their graphics with four quadrants. Such grasphics describe for example the employment balance. (Link www.daswirtschaftslexikon.com/d/vollbeschuppunggleichgewicht/vollbeschäftigunggleichgewicht.htm) The main idea is, that identical axes connect the varios diagramss and build up a causality-logic.
Motivation
Example: You plan to build a house. You will choose a field in the middle of the table of my table-calculation. Then you enter the list of main section of workings (milestones) above your selected field . To the right of this field you enter the subsections. In the resulting table you can assign which subsection is related to which main section. The sections can subdivided into fine-sections and really-fine-section. For example: I use the columns to the left of the field as really-fine-section for the involved companies.
In the example I have marked the relationships only qualitatively with x. Experienced planners can easily quote prices for software projects, time spent or dates.
Shown Screenshot explain the use as an example. As the following designation shows, it is also a good way to represent pedigrees in a compact manner.
Heuristic rules
Write down
- in the bar up the main features.
- in the bar to the right the child characteristics.
- in the bar down the grandchild characteristics.
- in the groin to the left the great-grandson features.
- in the bar up the UrUrenkelmerkmale
- ...
Create legends to show the relationships between the main bar and the lead bar.Empty table fields always represent no influence. In the simplest case, they take 'x' or a '1' for exist. More complex legends should always be noted on the main bar.
mode of action
Human short-term memory can usually only remember up to seven chunks (features) that are available for thought. The form of the presentation makes it possible to break down complex problems to manageable problems with less than seven chunks.
Worth knowing about Excel
Very often you have to add or delete a row or column. Define keyboard shortcuts if the spreadsheet does not know them.
Often you have to move rows or columns. Define keyboard shortcuts and link them with keyboard shortcuts such as ALT-SHIFT-Arrow-Down or ALT-SHIFT-Arrow-Up.
The texts for horizontal lists could be turned over the cell formatting by 270 °, so that one can create compact tables.
Easy solvable problems for the star logic table
It is applicable to any problem that can be broken down into sub-problems. The star logic table use a heuristic for solving problems according to the top-down principle or complex causal chains. It is in contrast to bottom-up heuristics such as the TDD programming strategy (test-driven development).You can use them for complex calculations, pedigrees, complex programming tasks, fixed planning, ....Complex interaction cycles such as weather, ecosystems, human metabolism, or the course of the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction can not be well described or studied because these systems contain non-linear feedback steps.
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