Changelog

What's new

Every release of ExcelSurge and SlideSurge, with notes. Already installed? The add-ins ping for new versions on launch and tell you when there's an update.

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ExcelSurge

8 releases
  1. v1.0.0.73#
    • **Fixed: Trace Dependents missed anything on another sheet** — dependents were only searched on the cell's own sheet, so tracing an input that feeds other sheets reported "no dependents" even when it drove the whole model. It now searches the entire workbook. This mattered most on exactly the cells you'd want to trace: an assumption has no precedents, and all of its dependents live elsewhere.
    • **New: colour-coded formula components in the Tracer** — each cell reference in a formula gets its own colour, the matching tree rows match it, and selecting a node highlights exactly where it sits in the formula. On the Dependents tab, the reference back to your traced cell is highlighted instead.
    • **Fixed: the Tracer invented precedents that weren't there** — a cell reference written inside quoted text (`="Total for A1"`) was treated as a real precedent, and function names that look like references (`=LOG10(B5)`) resolved to actual cells. Both are gone.
    • **Fixed: Company Theme could wreck a financial model** — applying a theme forced every value column to whole dollars, turning discount factors like `0.901` into `$1`, `81.6%` into `$1`, and `16.2x` into `$16`. Number formats are now matched to what each cell already is, so percentages stay percentages, multiples stay multiples, and prices keep their cents.
    • **New: Multiple, Price, Units and Foreign-currency formats in Company Theme** — valuation multiples (`16.2x`), per-share prices, share counts and a second currency each get their own setting instead of being flattened into one currency format.
    • **New: Quick Colors** (formerly IB Colors) — one-click colouring now has an editor: pick your own colour per cell type — hardcoded inputs, formulas, links to another sheet, and links to another workbook. Existing shortcuts keep working.
    • **Compare Workbooks: changed inputs are now flagged High risk** — a changed assumption is one of the most consequential edits in a model, and it was previously mis-filed as a formula change and left out of the Changed Inputs summary entirely.
    • **Fixed: the comparison report printed hardcoded values twice** — a changed input showed its value stacked on itself (`700` over `700`) in the Before/After columns.
    • **Fixed: the Company Theme window cut off its own Save button** on smaller and scaled displays.
    • Audit PDF: the methodology arrow no longer renders as an empty box.
  2. v1.0.0.62#
    • **Fixed: charts sent to PowerPoint now refresh** — exporting a chart with "Link to PowerPoint" recorded its name in a form SlideSurge couldn't find on refresh; new exports store it correctly and SlideSurge also heals links from older exports.
    • **Compare Workbooks: shift-aware comparison** — inserted or deleted rows are now tracked across sheets instead of showing every shifted row as a change, with a clearer "Changed Inputs" summary and a redesigned comparison report.
  3. v1.0.0.61#
    • **Redesigned Workbook Health pane** — a cleaner layout with a health-score ring, colour-coded finding cards, and quick Fix / Dismiss / Snooze actions on each finding.
    • **Much smarter audit, far fewer false positives** — formulas dragged across year columns, and rows that mix dollars and percentages (e.g. a % margin sitting under $ revenue), are no longer wrongly flagged as inconsistent.
    • **New performance checks** — the audit now catches whole-column references (e.g. `SUM(A:A)`), high-impact volatile functions like `OFFSET`/`INDIRECT` that force thousands of cells to recalculate, and conditional-formatting bloat — all under a new dedicated Performance score.
    • **A more trustworthy overall score** — the grade is now a weighted blend of the category scores, and the headline explains what's holding it down (e.g. "mainly held down by Dependencies").
    • **Better circular-reference detection** — finds every loop and lists its exact cells, and tells an intentional interest/debt loop apart from an accidental one.
    • **Fewer nuisance flags** — network and cloud (SharePoint/OneDrive) links are no longer reported as "broken", and the hardcoded-assumption and IFERROR checks are more precise.
    • Company Theme gains row-height, column-width and header-styling options; fixed a rare dialog rendering glitch; and IB Colors now recolours only numbers, leaving text labels untouched.
  4. v1.0.0.58#
    • Tracer redesign: the selected cell's formula now shows in a prominent wrapping bar at the top (value shown compactly at the bottom), and precedents expand downward like dependents.
    • Tracer "go to cell" now scrolls the target into view even across multiple windows and frozen panes.
    • Multi-cell range precedents now show a clear "drill in" prompt instead of a raw object placeholder.
    • You can now assign shortcuts using Home, End, Page Up/Down, Insert, Delete and the arrow keys (e.g. Ctrl+Home).
  5. v1.0.0.57#
    • Undo (Ctrl+Z) now fully reverses a color or formatting change applied to a whole-sheet selection (Ctrl+A) — previously nothing reverted.
    • One-click "Fix it" actions in the Workbook Health audit: recolor unmarked hardcoded inputs blue, and switch a workbook from manual to automatic calculation.
  6. v1.0.0.54#
    • Stability and reliability improvements.
  7. v1.0.0.51#
    • **New: in-app update notifications.** ExcelSurge now checks for a newer version on startup and shows a non-blocking notice when one is available, so you always know when there's an update.
  8. v1.0.0.43#
    • Initial public release.
    • Formula auditing and cross-sheet tracing with the **Trace** task pane.
    • Investment-banking color formatting (blue inputs, black formulas, green links).
    • One-click number formats and borders matching IB conventions.
    • Custom keyboard shortcuts via the visual **Shortcut Manager** — remap anything, no XML editing.
    • Command palette (Ctrl+Shift+E) with fuzzy search across every action.
    • Workbook health report — flags inconsistent formulas, hardcoded values inside formulas, broken links, and risky patterns.
    • Compare workbooks — diff two files side-by-side, see exactly what changed.
    • Live PowerPoint data linking — paste Excel ranges into PowerPoint that stay synced.
    • 14-day free trial, no credit card. Suite licensing — one $20/mo subscription covers both ExcelSurge and SlideSurge.

SlideSurge

6 releases
  1. v1.1.0.96#
    • **Set Company Theme is now a real editor** — name your theme, set heading and body fonts with size and bold, and pick every colour with a hex field or a colour picker. "Use Current Presentation" reads the open deck's fonts and colours into the fields, all still editable, and **Save Theme now keeps it between sessions** instead of forgetting it when you close PowerPoint.
    • **Themes understand more than "heading and body"** — SlideSurge now recognises slide titles, section headers, kicker labels, subheadings, body text, both bullet levels and footnote/source lines as separate styles, so applying a theme keeps a deck's hierarchy instead of flattening it.
    • **New: Quick Colors** — replaces IB Colors on the ribbon with a compact popup for fill, outline or text, one click to apply. The palette is yours to edit: click a swatch to change it, right-click to remove, `+` to add.
    • **Deck Audit catches invisible text** — dark text on a dark shape or background is now flagged, including the near-unreadable cases, with wording that tells you when the text is effectively invisible.
    • **A quieter, sharper audit** — hidden shapes no longer produce findings you can't act on, small "Source:" and footnote lines are no longer flagged as tiny text, and a new check spots titles that drift out of position between slides.
    • **Fixed: clicking a finding goes to the right shape** — where several shapes on a slide shared a name, every result jumped to the same one. Findings also now show a snippet of the shape's text, so you can tell them apart before clicking.
    • **Fixed: empty slides are one finding, not several** — three empty slides now report as one item listing all three, instead of three near-identical cards. Same for slides with speaker notes and charts missing a source line.
    • **Change Source is faster and no longer trips over open files** — pick the new workbook and compatible links repoint straight away, with anything incompatible left alone and reported. You can now pick a workbook that's **already open in Excel**, and Excel's "File in Use" prompt no longer interrupts the process.
    • **Fixed: linked Excel objects stay editable** — changing the source on an object pasted with Excel's Paste Link could turn it into a flat picture. It stays a live, double-clickable object.
    • **Fixed: missing link names heal themselves** — when a rebuilt workbook was missing the hidden ranges links point at, you had to run "Copy Names to New Source" by hand. That now happens automatically.
    • **Refreshed pop-out windows** — Manage Links, Set Company Theme and the progress and confirmation dialogs now use the same accent colour as the rest of SlideSurge, with the SlideSurge mark in the title bar.
    • **Better audit PDF** — the exported report is redesigned to match ExcelSurge's, with a cover score ring, category cards, top issues and a methodology page. Arrows in the report no longer render as empty boxes.
    • **New: Snooze a finding** — hide something for 30 days when it isn't worth fixing now. Dismissals and snoozes carry over correctly between audits.
  2. v1.1.0.78#
    • **Refreshed Deck Audit** — the audit pane now leads with a circular health-score ring (matching the ExcelSurge look), with the same finding cards, filters, and one-click fixes.
    • **Redesigned Manage Links** — a cleaner, easier-to-read dark layout with tinted status pills, a health summary (Healthy / Stale / Broken), per-workbook grouping, and a crisper typeface throughout.
    • **Fixed: linked charts now refresh** — a chart sent to PowerPoint with ExcelSurge's "Link to PowerPoint" could report "chart not found" on refresh; it now updates correctly, including charts from older exports.
    • **Right-click a linked object** for Update Link (refresh in place), Linked Worksheet Object (jump to the source range in Excel), and Change Source — mirroring Excel's own linked-object menu.
    • **Change Source is now one step** — pick the new workbook and the link repoints immediately, then simply asks whether to refresh; no separate confirmation.
    • **Readable Group by Workbook headings** — the workbook group titles are now clearly legible against the dark background.
    • Trace Source now jumps straight to the Excel source instead of leaving a marker box on the slide.
  3. v1.1.0.67#
    • **One-click update** — when a new version is available, the update notice now downloads and launches the installer for you directly, instead of just opening the download page.
    • **New: opt-in usage stats** — a Privacy setting (off by default) lets you share anonymous feature-usage data to help prioritize what gets built next. It only ever sends which feature ran — never any of your slide content.
    • **Fixed: settings no longer reset** — your preferences (including the usage-stats choice above) now persist correctly between launches instead of reverting each time you reopened PowerPoint.
  4. v1.1.0.63#
    • New: First-run welcome that points you to the Command Palette, the shortcut library, and Deck Audit.
    • New: "Fix all safe" — normalize fonts, sizes, colors, and alignment across the whole deck in one click, with one-click Undo.
    • New: Claim checker — flags when a stated multiple or percentage doesn't match the figures (e.g. "grew 3x to $9M from $2M" is actually 4.5x), each as its own finding with the exact math.
    • New: one-click "Restore" to un-mark anything you marked as fixed.
    • Improved: sharper overlapping-text detection, faster Command Palette, and more reliable startup + install.
  5. v1.1.0.51#
    • **In-app update notifications** — SlideSurge now checks for a newer version on startup and shows a non-blocking notice when one is available, so you always know when there's an update.
  6. v1.1.0.40#
    • Suite licensing — one $20/mo subscription covers both SlideSurge and ExcelSurge.
    • Refreshed shortcut pane design.
    • Deck audit engine — flags off-grid shapes, inconsistent fonts, low-contrast text, missing alt-text, and other deck hygiene issues.
    • Compare decks — diff two PowerPoint files side-by-side.
    • Live Excel data linking on the PowerPoint side — paired with ExcelSurge's outbound linking.
    • Command palette (Ctrl+Shift+E) with fuzzy search, matching ExcelSurge.
    • Theme manager — apply consistent fonts, colors, and styles across an entire deck.
    • Shape utilities — alignment, distribution, and snap-to-grid that PowerPoint should have shipped with.
    • 14-day free trial, no credit card.