Re: Large test spreadsheets

[Leonard Mada <discoleo gmx net>]

Hello Morten, hello everyone,


Morten Welinder wrote:
> > In an effort to move away from puting the burden on the developers, I began
> > designing functions that would compute intrinsically faster by expanding
> > existing functions to array functions:
> >  - PERCENTILE():
> >   http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/office-comment/200806/msg00011.html
> >
> >  - LOOKUP() and OFFSET()-functions will follow when I have some more time
> >     
>
> I went another route with VLOOKUP/HLOOKUP/MATCH in very
> recent versions of Gnumeric.  Basically, if the range is shared --
> and that is quite common -- then lots of preprocessing of the range
> is shared between cells.
>   

Indeed, the range is most often shared for these functions. This is the 
reason for my array-function proposal, like:
= { VLOOKUP( array1, range2, ...) }

In essence, my intention is to make existing spreadsheets more like 
multidimensional spreadsheets so as to benefit from the advantages of a 
multidimensional model: the user will basically define generic relations 
between the dimensions (where dimension = column), and not between 
individual cells.
e.g. [column D] = VLOOKUP( [column A], [sheetX!column X], ... )

Actually, I plan a more powerful replacement to the 
LOOKUP/OFFSET-functions, in order to solve the user's needs without 
putting the emphasis on the user to solve the problem (let the 
spreadsheet solve it elegantly and mostly automatically).

Sincerely,

Leonard

> I do not think there is a need to bother the user of the spreadsheet
> with this.  If we discover (real-life) sheets where such repetitive
> formulas using a common table cause serious problems, then it is
> not hard to fix.
>
> Morten
>
>