On Thursday 12 January 2006 06:08 am, Todd Walton wrote:
> On 1/12/06, Wade Curry <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > Another interesting feature is that each cell can have *both* a
> > numeric value *and* a text string value. This made intuitive sense
> > to me.
>
> That /does/ make sense. It's always seemed a little weird that the
> name of something would be peer to the the thing itself. It's like a
> vendor at a trade show using one booth for their signage and one for
> their people and product. But I always figured the interface for
> combining them would be too difficult.
>
> -todd
Bot Excell ands OO Calc allow you to give a name (text string) to
a cell. That name can be used in other cells in the formula. For
examples say I have
in cell C1, the formula =(A1+B1), which will cause the value C1 = A1+B1
then if I have name A1 <=> alpha and B1 <=> beta I can write in the
cell C1 the formula =(alpha + beta)
If I further name C1 <=> theta then I can use theta in place of C1 in
later formulas.
I occasionally use spreadsheets in rather unconventional ways
1) As an output format for reporting data generated by
a C program then imported as a comma delimited file
2) As an HTML generator, using export functions
3) As quick way to graph some data
4) As a simple way to sort some data. I can with a
single click and dialog sort on any column.
I see spreadsheets as just another tool. Good for some things
and not for others. People who know spreadsheets to the
exclusion of other tools almost always abuse the usage
since they know how to ... but not how to use the right
tool. I abuse spreadsheets as well because I can so easily
wrap a C program around its input and output to do some
quick hack.
Here is an example of this kind of abuse. The raw data
came from a spreadsheet and had originally been
imported from Microsoft Project. I did some simple sort/calc
then exported it as cvs and ran it through a simple filter
written in C to generate this primitive html report
http://www.prencesita.com/HH/show.html
Here is an example of using a spreadsheet to do simple
function fitting and graphing.
http://www.prencesita.com/MailStat/
I might like sc. Thanks for the mention. I will look it up.
BobLQ
--
[email protected]
http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
