To comment on the following update, log in, then open the issue: http://www.openoffice.org/issues/show_bug.cgi?id=32340
------- Additional comments from [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sat Mar 1 17:09:43 +0000 2008 ------- Though I cannot test the new version, I ran the 'test case' through OOo 2.3, and through MS Excel 97. For anyone who hasn't tried it yet, the test case exercises a number of direct, indirect, and built-in function accesses against several types of cell content, most especially an 'empty cell'. The sheet checks the resulting values against what it 'expects' to see, displaying 'ok' where the result value is as expected, and 'ERR' if (presumably) the result is not what is expected by the designers. As would be anticipated, OOo 2.3 displayed 'ERR' in several cells. Far from this being a problem, it underlines the 'correctness' of the test cases, because they can be seen to be exercising the cell content and reference methods that are giving problems in the current releases. And judging from the 'expected' behaviour, I personally am delighted that the problem I reported in 82725 likely has been fixed, well done, everyone. Unexpected, though, were a few 'ERR' displays when running the test case through MS Excel, (XL 97 in this test). The cell displays from the Excel 97 run are in the attachment - these show which specific reference methods give rise to 'ERR'. Since 'ERR' (presumably, as mentioned above) indicates a cell result that differs from the result that the OOo designers expect, 'ERR' displays imply that the new behaviour of OOo will differ from the behaviour of Excel. (XL 97, at least, and I have asked a colleague to check against XL 2003.) [My test procedure: 1. Open the test case i32340_variable_result.ods in OOo 2.3 2. Save as MS Excel 97/2000/XP with .xls extention 3. Open in Excel 97, view the cells, notice some display 'ERR' 4. Capture the results by converting all cells to their actual displayed value (select sheet, copy, paste special, values skipping blanks) 5. Save resulting data-only sheet as i32340_variable_result_testcases_XL97_results.xls 6. Open saved sheet in OOo 2.3 to resave in .ods format 7. Save as i32340_variable_result_testcases_XL97_results.ods to attach to this report] I think this finding raises 2 completely different questions. (1) Is the test case 'correct' in the sense that it embodies the logically/mathematically correct behaviour that we wanted OOo to exhibit? Presumably it is, but before we address any apparent interoperability problems let's be sure we are dealing with a genuine issue. (2) If we do have the intended behaviour in OOo, how, in general, do we solve any resulting problems of interoperability with MS Office? I've two suggestions here, though I would guess that tracking MS Office functionality has created issues before, and perhaps there's already a preferred approach. I would suggest: a. Confirm the existence of an interoperability issue, first. Create a specific interoperability test case (let's call it a behaviour case) and confirm it against Excel (97, 2000, 2003, 2007, separate cases if necessary). Run these behaviour cases against the existing OOo releases, and against the new developments that are believed to address the interoperating problems. Record the results so that we know what the confirmed problems are, if any. b. Consider the feasibility of an MS Office compatibility mode (a little like MS did for the Intel Pentium bug) which could be switched on or off. I hope the report makes sense and is useful. Can I close by again saying thanks to everyone who has worked on this issue? As already said, the problem I was hitting seems to be addressed. regards, Ron --------------------------------------------------------------------- Please do not reply to this automatically generated notification from Issue Tracker. Please log onto the website and enter your comments. http://qa.openoffice.org/issue_handling/project_issues.html#notification --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
