Re: All hail Neo!
From: Bob Badour <bbadour_at_pei.sympatico.ca>
Date: Wed, 26 Apr 2006 19:54:19 GMT
Message-ID: <LdQ3g.66237$VV4.1266489_at_ursa-nb00s0.nbnet.nb.ca>
>
> Interesting.
>
> I just fired up Excel 2003. I entered two columns of numbers, and
> left one cell empty in each column. Then I set the formula for the
> third column to be col1 + col2. Then I got the sum of the first two
> column. It behaved exactly as I propose: missing values were
> ignored, both on the vertical sum and on the horizontal sum.
> This preserves the SUM(A) + SUM(B) = SUM(A+B) property
> as well.
Date: Wed, 26 Apr 2006 19:54:19 GMT
Message-ID: <LdQ3g.66237$VV4.1266489_at_ursa-nb00s0.nbnet.nb.ca>
Marshall Spight wrote:
> JOG wrote:
>
>>PMFJI, I thought it might be useful to point out that spreadsheets have >>had to address this problem since their inception. As far as I know >>they, by default, ignore empty cells when averaging ranges, as opposed >>to dropping out with an error. As such they view the empty cell as as >>not existing in the range at all. If all cells are empty then no range >>exists and an error results.
>
> Interesting.
>
> I just fired up Excel 2003. I entered two columns of numbers, and
> left one cell empty in each column. Then I set the formula for the
> third column to be col1 + col2. Then I got the sum of the first two
> column. It behaved exactly as I propose: missing values were
> ignored, both on the vertical sum and on the horizontal sum.
> This preserves the SUM(A) + SUM(B) = SUM(A+B) property
> as well.
Then your spreadsheet behaves differently from your database.
My spreadsheet alerts me to a problem when I try to enter A+B where either is blank. Did yours not alert you to any potential problems? Received on Wed Apr 26 2006 - 21:54:19 CEST