Re: Help with time-phased budgeting app in Excel and curve-fitting

Dunno where Solver would fit in, but could this be something as simple as
using the trendline feature of a chart? Or, setting up your chart as a
scatterplot, with smoothing turned on, you can drag the data points around
to get the answer you want (I write this with great existential nausea).
Finally, you might consider using a cubic-spline fit to your data; I'm
having a bit of trouble understanding your post, so bear with me (or not):
for fitting data, code I posted some time back might help; Google for
Braden, under the groups microsoft.public.excel.*, looking for "cubic
spline", and you will find posted VBA code for what I have in mind--- it
will do a nice fit for your data, and give you tangents at desired points.

Mensch, good luck, and HTH

Dave Braden


"James Nasty" <j.grossiv@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1123198868.112114.116920@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>I am currently working on a time-phased budgeting app in excel for a
> client. I'm supposed to deliver the app to him by the close of
> business tommorow. I thought it was completed until I was told today
> that my calculations weren't right. Here's what the requirements of
> the project are:
>
> I need to time-phase budgets. generally, there are two scenarios I work
> in.
>
> The first is - there are no actuals or costs to date. I provide the
> number of periods to spread the budget over, I provide the amount to be
> spread, and I provide the "shape of the curve"....that is - if I said
> "50%" - then, at the 50% mark of 'time' (i.e., periods); 50% of the
> "amount" will have been spent; if I said "30%", then at the 50% mark of
> time, 30% of amount will have been spent.
>
> The second scenario is a situation whereby I've already incurred
> actuals or costs-to-date within my budget - and now I need to
> time-phase the remaining budget over the remaining number of periods.
>
>
> I was just informed that the slope of the curve he refers to is
> supposed to be an actual curve. I thought it was just used to spread
> budgeted amounts evenly among certain ranges of periods. I asked the
> client for a little more insight into how this curve things is to be
> calculated and he told me that he had an app that did this before and
> it used the solver in Excel and the curve-fit function. I did not find
> a curve fit function. I have been furiously searching the net all day
> trying to find out more about this curve-fit function or concept. If
> you can provide me with any more insight into this problem, i would
> greatly appreciate it.
>


.

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