•Design tools:representing the functionality and

appearance of solutions

Design Tools• Layout Diagram

– A visual depiction of the final solution– Design includes features like differences in

font size, color and positioning of objects– Diagram clearly indicates:

• Type of data to be entered into the cells in s.sheet• Content of each cell• Labels• Functions to be used• Validation rules• Cell protection

• Storyboard• Site Map

Design Tools• Layout Diagram, contd.

– Diagram clearly indicates:• Formats & conventions• Chart titles, axis labels and legend• Sorting to be applied to data

Layout Diagram – S.sheet, solution

Layout Diagram, graphic representation

Design Tools• Validating Data

– Manual validation, proofreading and manually checking for illegal data types, for reasonableness, correct spelling, etc.

– Electronic Validation:• Range checking, eg. postcodes, and if statement• Existence checking, whether or not a value is

present• Data-type checking, eg. numbers of phones are

integers and not decimal numbers• Restricted data entry, use of drop-down list

Formats and Conventions– Formats & conventions for spreadsheets:– Text

• One space after all punctuation• Consistency with margins widths, page numbering

etc.• Minimal use of different font sizes• Dates consistently set out, day/month/year• Use a serif font for paragraph text• Sans-serif font for headings, tables and diagrams

Formats and Conventions– Formats & conventions for spreadsheets:– Numerical information:

• Money values, usually 2 decimal places or none• Numbers are right-aligned in columns• Align decimal points• Position labels next to single numbers, eg. $5• Position labels for columns of numbers at the top

of the column• Percentages in columns appear at the top of the

columns, eg. %

Formats and Conventions– Formats & conventions for spreadsheets:– Graphics:

• Graphs and charts have titles• Use titles to identify the purpose of the graphic

representation• The X axis and Y axis must be shown in all graphs• Use a key/legend if more than one set of data is

provided on the graph or chart• Label each segment of a pie chart• Arrange pie chart segments from largest to

smallest