M Singh wrote: > Hello, > > I am using the latest openoffice calc (2.3) on Ubuntu Gutsy. Using > Crossover, I also have Microsoft Excel installed on the machine. > > I had a spreadsheet which was a tabulation of some material > properties (one > column with the name of the material and three columns with three > different properties. > > I wanted to sort the entire table on one column. In Openoffice.org > calc, I > selected the column I wanted to sort on and pressed the toolbar sort > ascending button. It worked but it didn't do what I wanted - it just > sorted that column, ignoring the possibility that the data in the > corresponding rows of the other three columns might possibly be related > (its a literally accurate response to my actions on the toolbar, but its > useless). I could not find any way to do what I wanted. > > So, just curious to see how Microsoft Excel would handle this > situation > (whether it would show some intelligence at all), I exported the ods file > to xls and opened it up in Excel. Did the same. Immediately, a pop up box > opened up asking me if I wanted to expand the selection as it had detected > some data around the column, or just wanted to sort it. > > I expanded the selection, and I was done. I wonder if people > designing > Openoffice.org Calc have given any thought to such situations ? After all, > when you have a spreadsheet with multiple columns, isn't it even remotely > likely (I would put the likelihood northwards of 99%) that the person > requesting the sort might have related data in other columns ? > > By all means, the present behavior of the program should be > present as an > option, but the other behavior is so much more likely to be the one that > the user wants, that it should at least offer the option to do the logical > thing. > > An example of the literally correct not being the logically > correct, and a > possible result of lack of real world trials of the code before releasing > it. > > I am not bashing Openoffice.org calc as I rely on openoffice > programs 90% > of the time when I am not using LaTeX, but one would have thought that a > program that is about 6 years old would have sorted out something as basic > as this with a function that is so common that it is on the main toolbar. > I refuse to believe that I am the first person to encounter this kind of > behavior and report it. > > Thanks.
The plot thickens. Thanks to a private correspondent who wrote to me after seeing this message, I have found that if one uses the Data | Sort workflow, one does get a pop up box asking which column I wish to sort on provided I select the entire spreadsheet before doing that. The main toolbar buttons do what I described in my first post. I wish Calc could mimic the Excel behavior as described here completely. What it currently does with the toolbar buttons is not terribly useful for most people (at least offer that pop up box). --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
