Excel Strike Planner

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skorpio667
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Excel Strike Planner

Post by skorpio667 »

Hi all,

I made a Time-on-Target Planner spreadsheet. It calculates mission execution times for different platforms in different groups with different roles (CAP, SEAD, Strike etc), different weapons and different ingress route (waypoints), but all part of the same strike package. The intend is to have all strike platforms deliver their weapons on the same time on target in order to swamp enemy air defenses.

Unfortunately, it seems MS Excel dependent, as another poster reported back it didn't work in OpenOffice (see a couple of posts down). The spreadsheet contains ActiveX and VBA elements.

Skorpio667


Version 1.08 for DB3K_v444 and CWDB_v443

Changelog v1.08
---------------
* Updated the data to DB3K v444 and CWDB v443 (as found in CMANO v1.11)

SEE POST 37 FOR Excel TOT SHEET v1.10 beta 1 for DB3K v480 for CMO
Attachments
CMANO ToT ..er v1.08.zip
(4.12 MiB) Downloaded 359 times
Dimitris
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by Dimitris »

No, not a problem with that. Just be aware that you'll have a problem keeping the values up-to-date when we release new DB versions.
skorpio667
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by skorpio667 »

Great! Yeah, I discovered that already, as I had to update them yesterday, when I discovered the new update earlier this week. With your schedule of a major update average 2 months on average, I might [;)]

However, I hope users should be able to update the tables themselves with a little Google, and coaching?!

Skorpio

EDIT: The spreadsheet contained some unnecesary vba code that generated an error and there were some other issue's. Should besolved now. Uploaded v1.031 DB3K441
EDIT 2: Removed file, download latest from first post.
jarraya
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by jarraya »

Skorpio,
I'm getting a runtime error in your code:

Private Declare PtrSafe Function getFrequency Lib "kernel32" _

The problem appears to be with the PtrSafe Function.
skorpio667
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by skorpio667 »

Hmmm, That vba module is not even necesary (It part of a timer code to calculate the time it takes to (re)calculate (parts) of the workbook).
Unfurtunately I discover some more typo's and errors. I'll update the file ASAP

Skorpio
skorpio667
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by skorpio667 »

Removed the error generating module and updated the file to v1.031. Jarraya, could you try again please?

Skorpio
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BradOrbital
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by BradOrbital »

Hi Skorpio667, thanks for this. Will this work in OpenOffice as well by any chance or only Microsofts Excel?
skorpio667
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by skorpio667 »

Bradinggs, I don't know. I learned the code, commands and structure on the fly, so I guess no special MS Excel-only commands are used, but really, I can't vouche for it.

Just try, I guess.

Skorpio
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BradOrbital
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by BradOrbital »

Will do, will give you any feedback on it. Thanks.

UPDATE EDIT: Seems best to use in Office then, doesn't appear to work with OpenOffice, as far as I can see VBA doesn't work in OpenOffice.

Btw, looking forward to learn how we can keep this up to date. Thanks again.
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Dysta
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by Dysta »

Admiral Saturatius will be utterly thankful for your contribution. [8D]

Need time to fiddle with it, too bad my old iPad is too slow to make me use it on-the-fly.
Rory Noonan
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by Rory Noonan »

I suspect keeping it up to date will only be an issue in the (relative) short term; IIRC ToT planning has long been identified as something that the Dev's want to implement.

Fantastic work on the spreadsheet though, it's clear a lot of work has gone into it. Good on you!
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skorpio667
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by skorpio667 »

Thanks! It took me a month to create it, working on and off on it. It went through 8 builds or so. Every time I "finished" it, I kept thinking on how to improve it's usefulness and completeness/comprehensiveness. BTW, any suggestions are welcome.

Using it on an iPad is actually a good idea, hadn't thought of that myself. I have 3 screens, so space isn't a real issue.
Any Excel-knowledgeable people out there to improve the speed of the code so it can be used on a tablet?

Like Apache85 says, let's hope the build-in strike planner come online very soon. But updating the tables takes about 15 to 20 min. Not to bad for a 2 month-on-average period, before the next DB comes out.

Skorpio
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stilesw
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by stilesw »

skorpio667

Incredibly impressive. Great tool that obviously took significant time and thought to complete. Kudos!!

Wayne Stiles
“There is no limit to what a man can do so long as he does not care a straw who gets the credit for it.”

Charles Edward Montague, English novelist and essayist
~Disenchantment, ch. 15 (1922)
skorpio667
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by skorpio667 »

Bradinggs, too bad it isn't application independent!

I seem to recall from a SQL-course during my study that SQL can do simple math, like that of this planner, too? If it could be written in SQL it would be more application independent and perhaps more efficient as the data lookup functions seem to take the bulk of the time needed to do the calculations. Then it could perhaps even be used on a tablet?
Does anybody know?

Skorpio
ComDev
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by ComDev »

Hehe this is veeery nice, thanks for sharing!

Version 1.11 adds slightly improved mission start and end functionality, so should make it a bit easier to work with too [8D]
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ExNusquam
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by ExNusquam »

Skorpio, this is great; it's a huge improvement over my previous method for planning strikes. Thanks for sharing!
skorpio667
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by skorpio667 »

Emsoy, in relation to the strike planner, would it be possible to pre-plot a mission from the mission planner, a bit like with the cruise missiles, so we could plan on an external planner and set course and altitude manually?
This would be nearly like the upcomming advanced strike planner you are working on (got this idea from a line apache85 said and added it to the feature requests too)

Skorpio
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by ComDev »

Hi Skorpio,

Yes this is planned. Horribly complex stuff so need to do it in baby-steps, but we'll get there eventually [8D]
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skorpio667
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by skorpio667 »

Emsoy, I think you mean the complete planner? I understand that is very complex and should be implemented in little increments.

I was hoping one of those increments (in the near future?) could be pre-plotting the course just like the course of the waypointed cruise missiles with manual lauch?

Skorpio
ComDev
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RE: Excel Strike Planner

Post by ComDev »

Yeah hope to add that soon. Not in v1.11 or v1.12 but perhaps v1.13 or v1.14. No promises though [8D]
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