The presumed cause of the bug is that the multinomial is computed as a ratio of factorials; this would indeed cause an overflow when the sum of the arguments exceeds 170. Please note that for the implementation of the Binomial in LibreOffice Calc (function COMBIN) no such restriction applies; it is computed carefully to avoid unnecessary overflow.
Please note also that the bug with multinomial would be almost trivial to fix. A recurrence for computing the multinomial function as a product of binomials may be found in the description of the multinomial function in the Sage mathematics system: http://www.sagemath.org/doc/reference/sage/rings/arith.html#sage.rings.arith.multinomial The associated 5-line Python code by Gabriel Ebner may be found here: http://trac.sagemath.org/sage_trac/attachment/ticket/3132/trac3132-2.diff I believe that this is a very natural way to compute the multinomial, and it would completely remove the problem of unnecessary overflow. -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Desktop Packages, which is subscribed to libreoffice in Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/891812 Title: [Upstream] Calc: MULTINOMIAL only supports parameters up to 170 Status in LibreOffice Productivity Suite: Confirmed Status in “libreoffice” package in Ubuntu: Triaged Bug description: 1) Lucid: lsb_release -rd Description: Ubuntu 10.04.3 LTS Release: 10.04 Oneiric: lsb_release -rd Description: Ubuntu 11.10 Release: 11.10 2) Lucid: apt-cache policy libreoffice-calc libreoffice-calc: Installed: 1:3.3.2-1ubuntu2~lucid1 Candidate: 1:3.3.2-1ubuntu2~lucid1 Version table: *** 1:3.3.2-1ubuntu2~lucid1 0 500 http://ppa.launchpad.net/libreoffice/ppa/ubuntu/ lucid/main Packages 100 /var/lib/dpkg/status Oneiric: apt-cache policy libreoffice-calc libreoffice-calc: Installed: 1:3.4.4-0ubuntu1~ppa1 Candidate: 1:3.4.4-0ubuntu1~ppa1 Version table: *** 1:3.4.4-0ubuntu1~ppa1 0 500 http://ppa.launchpad.net/libreoffice/ppa/ubuntu/ oneiric/main i386 Packages 100 /var/lib/dpkg/status 1:3.4.3-3ubuntu2 0 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ oneiric/main i386 Packages LibreOffice Calc 3.4.3, OOO340m1 (Build:302) 3) What is expected to happen in a blank LibreOffice Calc document is when one types in a cell: =MULTINOMIAL(1000,0) it returns 1. 4) What happens instead is it returns Err:502. More information about multinomial may be found at: http://help.libreoffice.org/Calc/Mathematical_Functions#MULTINOMIAL http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/excel-help/multinomial-HP005209186.aspx To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/df-libreoffice/+bug/891812/+subscriptions -- Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages Post to : [email protected] Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
