GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 166653
Improve formula detective/investigator
Last modified: 2010-06-11 20:24:07 UTC
Sorry, I don't know the correct term for this functionality. What I mean is the following: This nice colored rectangels which indicate the related cell-ranges if a formula is edited in the entry area. In a formula like =sum(A1+A2) Gnumeric shows only one rectangle, and only if the cursor is near or within the range parameter. XL and OO show all rectangels independant of cursor position. Helmut Wollmersdorfer
How is showing all rectangles better? In your example the cells are interchangable, but if they weren't it would be nicer to know which one corresponds to the current argument. I definitely prefer the current situation.
andreas : in XL the coloured coursors are coupled with syntax highlighting in the expression, and have the useful property of being draggable/resizeable. This gives a user a more visual mechanism for adjusting an expression.
Created attachment 37207 [details] screenshot of OO to show this feature Sometimes a picture (how OO colores syntax and boxes) says more than 1000 words.
I'd like to add that I've become extremely dependant on this feature for my excel work. It gives you a very easy way to check for mistakes in a formula such as clicking the wrong cells. This cuts down significantly on the number of mistakes I make.
Slightly OT: > In your example the cells are interchangable[...] Andreas, this is XL semantics; I hope you don't expect addition to be commutative or anything sane like that!
oh boy, colour coding. I guess the accessibilty people would have a field day with this one, especially since with the theming available the colours would need to be adjusted not to collide withthe real text colour etc.
> I guess the accessibilty people would have a field day with this one I doubt it: the feature is not essential for using Gnumeric. And even if all the range markers were the same colour they would still be useful.
Which colour would you suggest?
*** Bug 144709 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Andreas: I am not suggesting a specific colour. In fact I would just use a rainbow of them. My comment regarding "if all the range markers were the same colour" was to be understood as "people who cannot tell the colours apart will still be able to use the feature".
We are now showing all rectangles, but only if we are inside a range.
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.