Release Day has arrived

The official release of the Eve Industrial Organiser : Refinery release is currently being uploaded to eve-files, for your enjoyment.

The entire process of creating this iteration of the spreadsheet has gone so much more smoothly than ever and it's simply because it's more focused in it's design and is thus able to fulfil it without any extra overhead.

Without further ado I give you  http://dl.eve-files.com/media/corp/Sidrat/EIO_14_dec_2012.rar - use the direct download link as I doubt there's a torrent.

New Preview Copy Available Later Today - UPDATED

Importance of external testing

After testing by a corporation member found issues with the database, I have removed the download link from Eve-Files while I fix the issue on my side.  The database will be sanitized so that only the tables used will be present, this will keep the download as small as possible.

I've also correctly colour coded the Mineral To Ore sheet so it's more uniform across the sheet.  I want to distinguish more easily between the columns so users can differentiate between value types (difference between M3, isk and units).  I'm considering converting it to a table and having a colour coded scheme but no promises as I don't want to cause eye pain.

Back to work, I will update this post with the link when it's done.

UPDATE

You can download the link from http://dl.eve-files.com/media/corp/Sidrat/EIO20121212150106.rar -  Enjoy.

I have just realised that the "Refine Report" sheet was filtered for ships only, remove the filter on the category  column and enjoy.

Public Test Version

I have realised I would like to test what files will be required and what I can do to keep the links between the spreadsheet and the database intact.

Please download the file from http://eve-files.com/dl/259341 It contains three files, the evedb MS Access database file and the EIO: Refinery Excel Spreadsheet and finally the MarketPrices.xml file obtained from Eve HQ.

Please let me know what if any errors or problems you receive and I will do my best to provide a solution.

Contents Sheet

This page lists the sheets, what they're supposed to do, named ranges used within the sheet and so on.  It was a quick reference guide for myself so I could keep track of what was where and why.  Any hidden rows or columns is for the user benefit, either because they contain a column reference number or because they're blank.  It probably isn't a good idea to edit or delete these.

Eve HQ Usage

In previous versions I pulled market data from eve-central and updated different xml ranges.  This was a tedious and nightmarish process which I'm very glad I no longer have to do because of the local saving of the prices download provided by Eve HQ.

To download Market Prices from a particular region, complete the following steps after pulling your own character details.  This isn't necessary but makes the application look a lot nicer than a blank screen.

1. Start EveHQ.  On the View section of the ribbon, click the "Prices System" icon.
2. The Market Price screen has four tabs, click the Price Groups and tick the region you would like to select the prices for.  Above this section is the available columns.  I have eight selected although EIO Refinery uses only two, Median Price (Buy) and Median Price (Sell), however changing column count may cause import errors and EIO to report the incorrect value.  You can select as many regions as you like but EIO will only use one.
3. Go to the Market Prices tab, and hit the Download Market Prices button.  Wait for the process to complete after it Parses the regional data, both buttons are disabled while this process is running.
4. Congratulations you've made Eve HQ a lot more useful.
5. On the Ribbon bar in the API Tools section, select "Open APPData Folder". This will open the application data folder for Eve HQ.  You should have a folder called "MarketCache" and inside there you will find an xml document and a WinRar file for the region(s) you just downloaded the prices for.  Copy the xml file and paste it in to the same folder, rename it to "MarketPrices".  Cut and paste in to the location you saved the EIO:Refinery and Paste it there.
6. Open Evedb Access and open the query titled "Materials".  This may take a while.  Close Access.
7. You can now Refresh the "Materials" Table via the Design tab in the External Table Data.  Again this may take a while, the more cores the better.
8. You've completed the manual price update.  For best results, check the market before you buy or sell anything and enter totally up to date values on the materials important to you.
9. Don't forget to save the file or you're prices will be out of date again.
10. The price updating shouldn't need to be done more than once a day, just update the prices from EVE HQ every so often and rely on your own prices as these will ALWAYS be used first where present.

If you don't use this awesome programme you're missing out.  Download it from http://www.evehq.net/

Coming Soon

I will leave you with the enticing promise of more spreadsheet screen shots detailing my thought process on how to get the best results from EIO:Refinery so it works for you.  Perhaps combined screenshots will be easier on the eyes.

New Home For Eve Industrial Organiser.

I have started work on the new design and features of the Eve Industrial Organiser (EIO) suite for Microsoft Excel.

This Blog is now the home for the Eve Industrial Organiser suite of spreadsheet books and I look forward to receiving your comments.

If you're new to EIO allow me to explain the History behind the sheet.

History

It started many years ago when I really wanted to know two or three important factors when it came to the usual trade and manufacturing actions.

1. How much should I charge for item x?
2. How much should I pay for ore b?
3. What is the point of building item x when I can't buy the materials for under the market value?
4. What do those people know that I don't know?
5. How many units of ore should I obtain if I need x units of mineral type?

So I looked around back in 2007 for what other people had done and I didn't find anything that allowed me to enter multiple items in to a calculator and get the total material count.

Few people build one thing at a time, or even ten units of one item at a time - so I came up with a production calculator that told me what I needed to obtain for several items at once based on my Production Efficiency skill and the blueprint ME value.

Fast forward a few years and many iterations and I've gone from hand drawing tables, copying and pasting the formulas by hand and losing chunks of hair and sleepless nights.

Not only did the previous versions have a manufacturing calculator, a refining calculator and recently the AWESOME Mineral To Ore calculator as shown above.  It was also contained in one big sheet which took ages to load or many several sheets with interdependencies which caused bug hunting a nightmare, and you still had to load multiple sheets to update results any way.

The Future.

After taking some time away from the game, I have decided to come back and really tackle the issue of industry and spreadsheets.  I have decided to totally separate the different functions of the suite in to stand alone workbooks.   This solves the problems I've encountered before and keeps each workbook tightly focused to deliver only what it is supposed to deliver.  This might mean a lack of automated inventory management but we'll see.

The Retribution data export hasn't gone too well for CCP it seems and things were broken, misplaced or removed.  After two edits and a possible third I decided to bite the bullet and start work on the Refining work book.

This will be the first entry released to the public on Friday 14th December 2012, just in time to make yourself loads of ISK before Christmas.

Between now and after the New Year, I will be use testing the Refining sheet, and also working on the next release, the mighty EIO:Manufacturing book.  Featuring all your friends, the raw and extra material pivot tables and other stuff I have yet to decide whether I want to include or not.

As an early Christmas gift to you I present two further screenshots of the EIO:Refining book

The Contents sheet for the new Eve Industrial Organiser: Refinery

The Mineral To Ore calculator for the new Eve Industrial Organiser: Refinery