Information management and technology assurance

This month I am turning the tables; it’s your turn to face the challenge. A reader sent me the following Excel question, and I am submitting it to you for a chance to solve his problem: Q: I have created an Excel template in which we enter employee information and

Q: My computer contains several decades of Word documents scattered across many folders. Is there a quick way to produce a simple list of all of these documents that I can then sort in Word or Excel? A: I can think of at least three ways to accomplish this task,

Q: We frequently need to select samples of populations for test of transaction work when auditing or reviewing client financial data. Currently, each staff member uses his or her own sampling method, some of which seem to produce skewed results. We would like to deploy a consistent sampling method using

Q: I work with several massive Excel workbooks that contain large quantities of data consisting of many millions of rows, contained in multiple workbooks. As our data continues to grow, I find my current computer system to be inadequate. I need a computer that is not only powerful, but also

Q: Each day I export a list of outstanding accounts receivable balances consisting of several thousand customers, and it is my job to produce a report containing the customers with the 25 highest outstanding balances for follow-up. As illustrated below, the problem is that the accounting system produces a list

Q: When installing Office 2013 on my 64-bit computer running a 64-bit operating system, the Microsoft installation routine recommends installing the 32-bit version of Office 2013, but it also provides the 64-bit option of Office 2013, which seems to be the more obvious option. Which do you recommend and why?

1. View full URLs. In Safari, holding your finger on any hyperlink for a few seconds reveals the full URL and also allows you to copy that URL. 2. Full-screen videos. You can increase the size of a video to full-size screen by tapping twice on the video. Pinch the

Q: How can we tell if our internet service provider is delivering the internet speed we are paying for? A: There are many web-based internet speed tests, but use caution: Some so-called “speed tests” also install malware on your computer. For this reason, I like to use reputable speed tests

Q: Why is it that sometimes when I type a webpage address in Word, it converts to a hyperlink automatically, and sometimes it does not? A: Word recognizes and converts to a hyperlink webpage addresses containing “www” (such as www.irs.gov), but not those that don’t (such as irs.gov). The next

Q: I purchased a new television for use as a computer monitor and connected the device using an HDMI cable, but this solution is not working properly as my computer displays an oversized screen image that is about 10% too big for my monitor. This prevents me from viewing the

Q: Our company has finally decided to go paperless, but we are not exactly sure where to begin. Can you provide some guidance for getting started? A: Most CPAs who go paperless later report they are glad they did. There are many ways to reduce the amount of paper your