Ramble On

I had a client that about every six months would report that their current and very important financial Excel files would revert to versions days or months old. They insisted that they only had one copy of the file of the file server and none on their local machines. AutoRecovery in Office and specifically in Excel was the culprit. Heavy users of Excel would report this more often because they would open multiple instances of excel.exe and this would lead to strange behaviours and crashes which would then cause AutoRecovery to act strangely.

A couple of questions came to mind as I researched this. Why has it only affected Excel files and where is it pulling the old data from if there is only one copy of the Excel file on the server?

See the stories of all the people with the same issue below.

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Story 1.

http://www.computing.net/answers/windows-xp/excel-file-mysteriously-reverted/164766.html

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Story 2.

http://brettpeters.org/log/2003/04/15/argh.html

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Story 3.

http://www.tech-archive.net/Archive/Excel/microsoft.public.excel.misc/2008-02/msg01977.html

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Story 4.

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-6230-0.html?forumID=101&threadID=228504&start=0

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Story 5.

Also, notice the issue of opening multiple instances of Excel. Not sure if you use Excel like this but opening more than one excel.exe instance causes trouble with the AutoRecovery feature in Excel. You can only safely open one instance of Excel. See here.

http://forums.techguy.org/business-applications/673281-excel-autorecover-issue-2003-a.html

"AutoRecover and multiple instances of Excel When more than one instance of Excel is running and one instance closes unexpectedly, a new instance of Excel is automatically started and the AutoRecover files are opened. If all instances of Excel close unexpectedly, but the computer is still running, a single instance of Excel is started and all AutoRecover files are opened. In the case of a power outage, all recovered files are opened when you start Excel again."

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Excel 2003: The Missing Manual

Read pages 46 - 48 on how AutoRecovery works and is enabled by default.

http://books.google.com/books?id=v2fi86XfKiwC&pg=PA48&lpg=PA48&dq=%22it+looks+for+AutoRecover+backups%22&source=web&ots=TZhfUnrDeR&sig=mhc1lS9u_2x2f6BZVxG4PEQmjTQ&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result

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"Disable AutoRecovery In Excel

Excel automatically saves your work every few minutes. This is referred to as the Autorecovery feature and it is included in other Office applications. Autorecovery is designed to prevent loss of work from power outages, application errors, and so on but has proved very buggy especially in Excel. The AutoRecover option is annoying because you are unable to modify the spreadsheet while the file is being saved."

To disable the AutoRecover feature in Excel 2003:

1. Open Excel.
2. From the Tools menu, click Options
3. In the Options dialog box click the Save tab.
4. Under the Workbook Options, check the Disable AutoRecover option.
5. Click OK.

This is just absolutely incredible. Watch this video to see how a medical break through is allowing people to grow back their limbs! They are doing clinical trials with this for soldiers and for complete internal organs inside the body. Wow.

Link: http://www.doctorhousingbubble.com/when-100000-makes-you-go-broke-the-invisible-hand-forces-americans-into-debt/

The dollar is sliding into oblivion. With the buying power of the US dollar shrinking at incredible rates $100,000 is no longer enough money to keep a small family in the middle-class bracket. Take a look at this article from http://www.doctorhousingbubble.com that highlights this serious concern. It would be different if wages were going up as fast as our buying power was being dimished. Greed and Washington to blame.

"Going broke with a $100,000 income. And these people aren’t the folks leasing BMWs or Lexus cars but living a more modest middle class lifestyle. The fact of the matter is, life just got a whole lot more expensive because your green dollar in your wallet is magically disappearing and we don’t need David Blaine for that kind of magic. You can thank the true magicians on Wall Street and Washington D.C. for that."

Link: http://www.juneauempire.com/stories/041708/loc_269314122.shtml

Juneau (Alaska's Capital City) has been dealt a difficult blow this week. The main power transmission line to Juneau from the Hydroelectric dam about 40 miles south of town went down after an avalanche 1.5 miles across wiped out 5 - 7 large transmission towers that carry the power to the capital city. These towers were built years ago by the Army Corp of Engineers and then given to the privately owned AEL & P

The towers were not engineered obviously to survive such a disaster. The whole city now faces a 500 percent increase in utility costs. The city is currently utilizing backup generators which consume 100,000 gallons of diesel a day. There is concern that AEL & P might not be able to keep the generators running smoothly for the 2 - 3 months necessary to finish the repairs especially considering that they cant even know where to start until 20ft of snow is removed (melts?) from from some of the tower locations.

Link: http://www.brain-surgery.us/mobilephone.html

Having used a cell phone for the better part of 5 years I do wonder what the long term effects of holding this antenna to my head every day are. This double PH.D Neurosugeon thinks the risks are high after researching all of the the most recent studies done - some of which where done by the cell phone companies themselves.

"Widespread, unchecked use of mobile telephones could potentially pose a greater threat to human health than asbestos or smoking, according to a Canberra neurosurgeon.

Vini Khurana held a 14-month investigation into the link between heavy, long-term use of mobile telephones and the development of malignant brain tumours, reviewing more than 100 international studies on the subject."

Here is an interesting statistic

"The Central Brain Tumor Registry of the United States (CBTRUS) has recorded an approximately 15% increase in the incidence of primary brain tumours between the period 1998-2002 compared with the period 1990-1994. This increase has all been in the “MRI” age of the USA, a fact that suggests that the increase is not due to “better detection” or “earlier reporting”, since MRI was widely available in the US during this period of time."

Central Brain Tumor Registry
http://www.cbtrus.org/reports/reports.html

Researchers Website Here
http://www.brain-surgery.us/mobilephone.html

MP3 of ABC interview here
http://www.brain-surgery.us/ABC_27_3_2008.mp3

PDF of Study Here
http://www.brain-surgery.us/mobph.pdf

Oh man! This guy is fantastic. Super inventor Dean Kamen demonstrates his water purifier to the world. But this is no ordinary water filter. Colbert has had Dean on before to talk about his bionic arm invention for military personnel who have lost limbs. I have seen clips of Dean's vapor distiller before and they have always appeared rough but this model looks ready for production. Ok Dean - Do you think you could help us with a little thing called Alternative Energy? It would probably take him a couple of saturday's.

Watch the video - this is a bit spooky. Audeo has invented a device that can read your brain patterns and then translates it into speech. Remember Clint Eastwood in Firefox? It can only identify a basic selection of 150 words but this technology is moving fast. Next year they (Emotiv) are supposed to come out with some of the new thought controlled game interfaces. Sweet. Look Ma No Hands Counterstrike and silent read-my-thoughts team-speak!

I always get a good chuckle out of these commercials.

Like everyone else I am wondering were to put my money with all this turmoil, recession, depression talk. Equity markets definitely aren't safe, commodities have exploded and interest rates are at an all time low. I have been listening alot lately to Jim Rogers and Professor Burton Malkiel - the author of 'A Random Walk Down Wall Street and leading advocate of the efficient market hypothesis.

Here is what Dr. Malkiel has to say.

"I believe the Chinese Yuan RMB is the most undervalued currency in the world today...I believe the Yuan will continue to appreciate against other currencies. The Chinese government is not letting the Yuan float freely, but it has allowed an annual appreciation during the past two years of more than 5 percent against the US dollar. I believe there will be upward pressure on the Yuan for many years to come and I believe that the undervaluation of the currency is one of the many reasons why investors should have some exposure to Chinese equities."

Here is a recent interview of Jim Rogers on the markets. You have to listen all the way to the end to catch his message on the Chinese RMB.

Too bad there are currently no RMB ETF's in which to invest in although I hear there is one in the works. I'll be watching for that.

PS Why cant they hire some old decent news anchors to ask Jim Rogers some decent questions. Not some blonde!?