yogi_Simulate A TimeLine Chart From A Table Of Dates and Events In A Spreadsheet

                                           Google Spreadsheet   Post  #860
              Yogi Anand, D.Eng, P.E.      ANAND Enterprises LLC -- Rochester Hills MI     www.energyefficientbuild.com.    Nov 07, 2012
user doebtown said : (http://productforums.google.com/forum/?zx=xdgf04nj8c5p#!mydiscussions/docs/lhpYB3vx0Cs)
Create a simple timeline
Column A has dates. Column B has events that are associated with those dates.

All I want to do is place points along a line that represent the dates with labels for the events that took place on those dates. Obviously, though, I want the dates to be relative to each other.

Can this be done?

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Here's a copy of the data I want to chart:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AjsoIob8dJfodHo4ZklxcjZJamxwVDNhclVnZVhNaUE

I just want the timeline to be a vertical line with the points along the line in their relative positions. (The point here is to try to show the court the temporal relationship between the events: certain events must be related to other events because they all happened at the same time.)

Does that make sense?

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 Here's a mock up of what this timeline would look like in an ideal world:

https://docs.google.com/drawings/d/1NyoTmr-dztAIGoxLHuXRL-8yUkPqazUd1EG-XCc5eEc/edit

(Obviously, I've only roughed in a few of the points and their relative position has not been calculated with precision.)

Note that it looking exactly like this is NOT essential. My hope is that using a spreadsheet will help precisely plot the points along the line, which is far more important than the exact mechanics of the visuals.

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in the following I had a little play to create a simulated TimeLine Event Chart

yogi_Query For Dates That Are Older (Newer) Than A Specified Number of Days From Today

Yogi Anand, D.Eng, P.E.       Google Spreadsheet    Post  #639   Jul 18, 2012     www.energyefficientbuild.com.


user doebtown said:(http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!category-topic/docs/spreadsheets/7yp-tDajmsE)
Query for dates that are older than 10 days from today 
I have a Google Form that feeds a spreadsheet. Obviously, Column A of the spreadsheet is the Timestamp from the form. So all I want to do is set up a query on a different sheet that shows only rows where the form was submitted more than 10 days ago. So why doesn't this query work:

=query(Master!A:C, "select C where (A < (now()-10))")

It's making me crazy! 

This query works just fine:

=query(Master!A:C, "select C where (A < (now()))")

So why doesn't it work when I try to subtract 10 days?

I've seen and used queries where all sorts of machinations are necessary to convert now() to text, then back to a date to compare it to a user inputted format of a date. As shown here:

=query(Master!A:C, "select C where (A < date '"&text(now()+30,"yyyy-mm-dd")&"')")

(But even THAT operates on now()+30!)

But since the Timestamp and now() both use the exact same formats now()-10 SHOULD be all I need. I can enter =now()-10 into a blank cell and IT works just fine. Why won't it work in the query. 

I suspect it has something to do with quotes, but I've tried all sorts of iterations of it and I can't get it right.

Could somebody just please help me? Before I go crazy with this stuff?

Thank you in advance. Many times over!

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following is a solution to a little more generalized problem