GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 463996
Auto-correct interferes with names like "XXblah"
Last modified: 2007-08-07 17:32:26 UTC
OS: Ubuntu 7.04 Gnumeric Version: 1.7.8 and 1.7.12 (Updated to revision 15728) Summary: Names starting with two uppercase letters (e.g. XXname, XYname) can't be used in formulas. Gnumeric tries to fix the capitalization and changes the 2nd letter to lowercase (e.g. Xxname, Xyname) causing #NAME errors. To reproduce the bug: 1) Name cell A1 to XXname (using Ctrl+F3 or enter the name directly into the name box in the main window - btw, what is this control called?) 2) Set cell A2 to "=XXname" Results: #NAME in A1 A2 formula is transformed to "=Xxname" Note: Names like XYZname and XandYname are not affected. Formulas like "=XXsheet!XXname" are not affected.
This problem has been fixed in the development version. The fix will be available in the next major software release. Thank you for your bug report.
That fixed the problem but also took away some functionality. setting A1 to ="SOme text " & B1 is no longer auto-corrected to ="Some text " & B1 Was that intended?
I thought about that and decided that auto-correct would still solve its main task, namely fixing string constants. Actually, the more I think about it, the more I think we should leave formulas alone. For string constants, at the least the user can immediately see the result. For formulas, the surprise effect can be much bigger. For the record, XL seems to fix some thing while you are editing and also inside formulas.
Thanks.