It may not help you, but here is further information about what is
happening.
The SUM() function calculates the sum of all of the items you give to
it. In OpenOffice, items are
always separated semicolons. So, for example:
=sum(a1;a10)
means "sum up the contents of cell a1 and cell a10."
But consider this: Items in OpenOffice can be single cells like "a1"
or they can be entire ranges of
cells like "a1:a10" or "a1:c10". That's the great power of
spreadsheets--you can talk about huge
numbers of cells all at once and do computations with them. Note
that I used a colon in this
case because the colon is used to separate the starting and ending
cells in a range like
"a1:a100". So, remember a range of cells is an item just like "a10"
is an item.
So, now look at
=sum(a1:a10)
How many items are specified in this example? Just one---a range of
cells from a1 to a10.
While it is true that this example differs from my first example only
in that one has a colon and
the other has a semicolon, I hope you can see the difference--one
sums two items and the other
sums up all the cells in single items that contains a range of cells.
Of course, you can combine these as well:
=sum(a1:a10;b1:b100)
means add up a1, a2..., a10, b1, b2, ...., b100. This example lists
two items, each of which is
a range of cells.
On Feb 20, 2007, at 3:46 PM, Walter Hildebrandt wrote:
Thank you for the help. I have learned that when adding up a
column of many cells with the SUM command, the colon : uses all the
cells to get the total while the semi-colon used just the first and
last cells in the column. Whether the numbers are negative or not
does not does not matter. Since the difference between a colon and
a semi-colon can be very confusing, I think this is a weakness of OOo.
Dan Lewis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: On Tuesday February 20 2007
11:13 am, Walter Hildebrandt wrote:
When there is a negative number in a column of numbers and the SUM
command is used and a ; (semi-colon) is used to separate the two
cells, the total is correct. However, if a : (colon) is used to
separate the two cells, the total is not correct. What is the
different meanings of the semi-colon and the colon when used in the
SUM command?
That is strange. Please give an example of this. My experience is
not the same as yours.
I entered +1, -3, +2 in cells A1 through A3 respectively. I
entered SUM(A1:A3) in A4. The result was 0 as it should be. When I
entered SUM(A1;A3) in A4, the result was 3 When I entered
SUM(A1;A2;A3) in A4, the result was 0.
My conclusion is this. The : (colon) states the entire range to
be added. The ; (semi-colon) allows you to add the individual cells
you list.
If your total is not correct when using the : (colon), then
possibly one or more numbers are formated as text.
Dan
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