Final Project statement and

guidelines

Advanced Knowledge of Spreadsheets

2022-2023
1 Objectives
The objectives of this practical case are aligned to the capabilities to be acquired during the
present course. The main goal is to ensure that each team member has been equipped with
the following skills:
• Be able to create books and spreadsheets organizing data and the management of
data cells.
• Acquire the skills to create series and insert comments including the spreadsheet
styling and formatting.
• Be able to manage spreadsheets: copy and paste operations, insert, remove cells,
rows and columns.
• Use different types of formula, absolute and relative references and management of
operations and operators.
• Understand the structure of a formula, sorting and filtering data.
• Understand the use of tables: formatting, management and sorting and filtering of data.
• Define and make a proper use of the data analysis capabilities in MS Excel: scenarios
and solver.
• Understand the creation and management of charts: titles, captions, edges, images,
etc.
Assuming that in some cases it may not be possible to make a Project that meets all the
characteristics, we do expect a Project that meets all basic and intermediate level requirements
and some of the advanced MS-Excel features.

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2 Project description
The practical character of the Project looks for applying the tool MS-Excel and some of its
features to solve a real use case.

Type Group
Team members Two (2) people, in some cases and due to justified
exceptions one (1) or three (3)
Grade 0 -10
Min. grade 5.0
Weight 40%
Deadlines See Chapter 6-Deadlines
Submission See Chapter 5-Delivery and submission.

The Project shall generate as final outcome a dashboard as entry point for end-users in
which it will be possible to operate, browse, analyze and exploit all elements from a numerical
(e.g. absolute/percentual values, predictions, etc.), textual (e.g. input data to filter, etc.) and/or
graphical perspectives (e.g. different types of charts). This dashboard shall take as an input
different types of trustworthy datasets approved by the professor.
Those works including a set of isolated sheets will not be accepted.

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3 Requirements

The evaluation and degree of compliance of each requirement will depend exclusively
on the instructor’s criteria.
It is important that all team members pay attention to meet all requirements at an acceptable
level of quality to ensure that the instructor can properly evaluate both the quality and the
fulfillment of each requirement.

3.1 Non-functional requirement

NFR-1. The final Project shall manage as an input at least 1000 different values.
◼ The input values shall be, at least, 1000 data items or 500 tuples with 2 different fields
(or any other combination to get at least 1000 data items).
NFR-2. The Dashboard shall be compliant with MS-Excel 365.
◼ As a recommendation, the Dashboard should be tested in Aula Virtual to ensure the
compatibility with MS-Excel 365.
NFR-3. The final Project deliverables shall be submitted according to the guidelines
established in Chapter 5 Delivery and Submission.
3.2 Functional requirements
IMPORTANT REMARK: If a team selects as a type of work a task to solve a NP-hard
problem with the Solver capability, the evaluation of the MS-Excel Mid and Advanced level
capabilities will be adapted to the technical complexity of the proposed problem.
3.2.1 MS-Excel Basic level requirements
The final Project shall make use of at least three different data types and formats.
◼ Data formats and types are those available in the Tab “Home”, section ”Number”.
◼ The use of different data formats and types will be validated when are not automatically
assigned by MS-Excel.
The final Project shall make use of at least three different types of formatting styles.
◼ Formatting styles are available in the Tab “Home”, sections “Font”, “Alignment” and Tab
“Page Layout”.
The final Project shall present information aligned to the type of data.
◼ As some examples, if a data item represents a date, it is expected a date format. If a
data item represents a percentage, a proper formatting (% symbol) is expected.
3.2.2 MS-Excel Mid-level requirements
The final Project shall make use of some logical function.
◼ The objective is to make use of some function to get a value that will be presented to
the end-user or used for an intermediate calculation. This is applicable to the rest of
functional requirements.
The final Project shall make use of some text function.
The final Project shall make use of some information function and/or any other type
of function (e.g. math, lookup, etc.).
◼ In the case that a function is not applicable, it is recommended to justify if other
MSExcel capabilities have been used as a substitution of the explicit use of functions.
The final Project shall make use of some formula
The final Project shall make use of at least one table and one pivot table.
◼ The use of a table or a pivot table shall be justified because of some operation of
filtering, sorting, etc.
The final Project shall make use of at least one chart and one pivot chart
◼ These charts shall be selected according to the type of information and objective.

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3.2.3 MS-Excel Advanced level requirements
The final Project shall make use of at least 3 of the following MS-Excel features.
1. Conditional formatting.
2. Forms.
3. User-defined forms.
4. Mini charts.
5. Macros and buttons.
6. Goals.
7. Scenarios
8. Solver.
9. Any other feature available in MSExcel that does not fall in the previous ones
and after the approval of the instructor.

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4 Methodology
Given the need of applying the concepts and capabilities of MS Excel to solve a problem, the topic of the work and the data to be used are
completely OPEN. However, a methodology has been outlined as a set of guidelines that must help you to design and implement a proper work.

Stage Step Tasks Comments

Specification 01 Establish the type of application. Some examples will be provided in Aula global.
02 Define what capabilities (data and As a recommendation, think and define some user stories as follows:
functionalities) will be offered to the end-
user through the Dashboard.
As a <role> I want to <capability> , so that <need>

As a business analyst I want to compare financial indexes so that I

can check how they evolve.

As a team leader I want to assign tasks to my team members so that

my team can be more productive.
03 Establish the required data. Make a crosscheck of the requirements established in this document
to ensure that it is possible to fulfill all MS-Excel Basic level
capabilities (section 3.2.1).
Design 04 Select the appropriate data sources and Examples of official (and recommended) data sources:
datasets. • INE: www.ine.es/datosabiertos/
• Banco Mundial: https://datos.bancomundial.org
• Eurostat: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat
• Open data catalog: http://datos.gob.es/es
Other trustworthy sources:
• Kaggle: https://www.kaggle.com/
05 Get the datasets. ---

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Stage Step Tasks Comments
06 Make a preliminary analysis of the This step is to crosscheck if it is possible to reach what has been
datasets and typology of data. established in Step 03, otherwise other datasets may be necessary.
Implementation 07 Define a strategy for data processing to This step is to ensure the data quality (completeness, consistency
deal with: missing values, incorrect and correctness) avoiding potential misleading or incorrect results
values, etc. (e.g. a wrong data visualization).
08 Implement the step 07 high-quality ---
values.
09 Check if the remaining data items are ---
enough to fulfill the established
requirements in NFR-01.
10 Define and implement the Dashboard. Make use as many sheets as necessary to prepare data, perform
calculations, etc.
Verification and 11 Test the Dashboard functionalities in Focus on verifying the dashboard provides what has been
Validation regard to the expected capabilities established in the step 02.
established in Step 2.
Delivery 12 Make a video script and record a video ---
to submit the deliverables of this work.

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5 Delivery and submission

The partial, incomplete or incorrect delivery of all the items required in the
FINAL DELIVERY will be considered as NOT SUBMITTED implying that the
delivery will not be evaluated.
5.1 Preliminary delivery
1. A MS-Excel file containing a sheet named as “METHODOLOGY”:
o Each of the 12 steps shall be in a different row identified by the step
number.
o It is only necessary to complete the Specification and Design steps (01-
06).
This preliminary delivery is NOT evaluated but it is mandatory to submit the final
delivery. A submission task will be available in Aula global until the 23.55 of the
last day for submissions.
5.2 Final delivery
A package (e.g. compressed file) containing:
1. A MS Excel file containing a functional Dashboard and:
a. The sheet “METHODOLOGY” including a brief description of each step
as a kind of documentation.
b. A sheet named “README” containing the following information:
i. Team ID.
ii. Name, Family Name and NIA of all team members.
iii. Link to a shared Google Drive folder in which the MS-Excel file
and the video demo are shared. This is just a backup in case of
issues when submitting the package via Aula global
2. An MP4 (or similar format) video of a minimum of 3 minutes and a maximum
of 10 minutes explaining the methodology and the dashboard that has been
implemented.
A submission task will be available in Aula global until the 23.55 of the last day
for submissions.
5.3 Video demo presentation
The video demo will be used to assess the individual contribution and the skills of
each team member. This video shall meet the following requirements:
1. Each team member shall present during the minimum of 3 minutes some part of
the dashboard and the methodology.
2. The presentation of each member shall address some of the steps of the
methodology making clear that all requirements established in the Requirements
section have been reached.
3. It is especially relevant to spend time (e.g. 1 minute) explaining the main goal of
the dashboard and the selection of data sources and data sets.
4. The max duration of the video shall be up to 10 minutes.
5. If a team member does not make the corresponding presentation in the video,
the grade for that member will be NOT SUBMITTED.
6. The quality or post-production of the video are NOT evaluated.

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6 Deadlines
This work has the following milestones and deadlines (the delivery date will
correspond to the class day for each group):

3 credit 1.5 credit Date

group group
Team creation Session 2 Session 2 12th of September, 2022
Final Project Session 3 Session 2 19th of September, 2022
presentation(Professor)
Preliminary delivery Session 8 Session 4-5 24th of October, 2022
Final delivery Session 13 Session 6-7 28th of November, 20202

In the 1.5 credit groups the delivery dates are planned for those weeks in which there
is not session planned (in red).

In any case, task submissions will be available in Aulaglobal including the specific day
and time for each group.

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7 Assessment criteria

The evaluation and degree of compliance of each requirement will depend

exclusively on the instructor’s criteria.

All assessment criteria are evaluated between zero (0) and ten (10).

As a reminder, before applying the formula to evaluate each requirement, there are
restrictions that will automatically mark your work as NOT SUBMITTED
1. Submissions after the due date including those incomplete or incorrect as
established in section 5.
2. Missing Video demo presentation (see Section 5.3)
There are also some situations that will automatically lead to work graded as “FAILED”
1. Not having the approval of the professor regarding the selected data (incorrect,
not enough or bad quality data).
2. Any form of plagiarism.
3. Any non-compliance with the code of conduct and normative established by the
School of Engineering, Faculty or University in regard to teamwork.
4. Lack of fulfillment of any of non-functional requirements.
The evaluation of requirements will be done by calculating a ration between the
requirements fulfilled and the expected requirements in each level of difficulty:
• G1: number of MS-Excel Basic Level requirements fulfilled / total number of
number of MS-Excel Basic Level requirements.
• G2: number of MS-Excel Mid-Level requirements fulfilled / total number of
number of MS-Excel Mid-Level requirements.
• G3: number of MS-Excel Advanced Level requirements fulfilled / total number of
number of MS-Excel Advanced Level requirements.

These values will be aggregated through a weighted operator as follows:

𝐺1 + 2 ∗ 𝐺2 + 3 ∗ 𝐺3
∗ 10 = 𝐺𝑅𝐴𝐷𝐸𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑘
6

0.8 𝐺𝑅𝐴𝐷𝐸𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑘 + 0.2 𝑉𝑖𝑑𝑒𝑜 𝑑𝑒𝑚𝑜 𝑝𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 = 𝐹𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑙 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑗𝑒𝑐𝑡 𝑔𝑟𝑎𝑑𝑒

Given the fact that some aspects like the look and feel of the dashboard, the number
of different datasets or the quantity and quality of data are subjective, the instructor will
have the opportunity of applying a bonus of up to 1 extra point to the Final project grade.

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