Spreadsheets versus MathCAD or SageMATH 5

[CELinOttawa]

This says it all in terms of what I want to discuss; do you believe it? How do you approach your own work? I have always been an avowed spreadsheet guy, but this had the exact intended effect and has made me *pause* to think.

Thoughts?

Source:

https://www.ptc.com/~/media/Files/P...rGraphic_Disaster_Waiting_to_Happen.pdf?la=en

 

[IRstuff]

Tools are just tools; I use both Excel and Mathcad for various and sundry things. The primary advantages of Excel are:
> billions of usages, so inherent "bugs" should be few
> ubiquity; millions of computers have it, and there are a number of programs that are compatible with, or can read, it.

Nevertheless, Mathcad maintains its unique advantage, its ability to deal with units transparently, and on the fly, as well as having a WYSIWYG display. Being able to see an equation in its native form is an extremely useful capability.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKorP55Aqvg

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[drawoh]

CELinOttawa,

Are these engineering spreadsheets, or something else? KPMG is a accounting, management consulting firm. Are the errors due to something inherently stupid in Excel, or confusion on the part of the Excel operators, or are they bad data?

--
JHG

 

[IRstuff]

The footnotes are pretty clear

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKorP55Aqvg

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[drawoh]

IRstuff,

It is also clear from the footnotes that some of that data is almost thirty years old.

--
JHG

 

[IRstuff]

And the rest is about 20 years old, but I don't see that the oldness necessarily invalidates the data. If anything, it makes it worse, now, since people who are using spreadsheets today might have even less training than those that used spreadsheets 20 yrs ago/

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKorP55Aqvg

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[JAE]

20-30 years ago spreadsheets were DOS based and much more difficult to debug and review for accuracy.



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[IRstuff]

The fundamental architecture of VisiCalc is still present in Excel, i.e., a cell where you type in formulas that may reference the contents of other cells. And, we were running Excel on i386 computers in 1985. The only thing that's really changed is the deprecation of the "/" commands that were endemic in VisiCalc, Lotus, Quattro, and other early spreadsheet programs.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKorP55Aqvg

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[3DDave]

Even today, users will enter text data with extra leading and trailing spaces making MATCH and xLOOKUP fail to find them without a lot of other monkeying around.

Simply entering the data is too hard for some users.

 

[BUGGAR]

I still use Basic (GWBasic). There's now a PCBasic, which is open source and even works with windows 10 and still reads the old stuff.

 

[dik]

Gee Whiz...

Dik

 

[CELinOttawa]

Hey Dik: How many programs did Buggar just bring back from the dead for you? Three over here from our old files, lol...

 

[BUGGAR]

One of the old favorites.

 

[drawoh]

...

Simply entering the data is too hard for some users.

Do you want to cross a bridge designed by a person who cannot load a spreadsheet properly? Are they skilled enough to program MathCAD properly?

If someone were to approach me and ask to use one of my analysis spreadsheets for their analysis, I would reply that my spreadsheet is designed for my analysis, not yours. I would then point out that I learned a lot more creating the spreadsheet, than I did using it.

--
JHG

 

[Sparweb]

BUGGAR,
I tried you code.
I have "JustBasic" which does nor recognize a line. What is this line supposed to do?
[tt]380 ON T1 GOTO 390,430,520,520[/tt]
How does the program flow go to 4 lines at the same time?

CEL (and others),
MathCAD is over 20 years old, too. I've been using it for 15 years, myself. Like Excel, it's gone through many transformations, but I still use it for 99% the same way I did when I started.

I think Drawoh's comments are just as valid whether written one way for spreadsheets, or the other way for MathCAD.

STF

 

[IRstuff]

"380 ON T1 GOTO 390,430,520,520
How does the program flow go to 4 lines at the same time?"

It doesn't. T1 is assigned a value in 140, and depending on what value T1 is, 380 allows the program to branch to different functions, based on the type inputted by the user.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKorP55Aqvg

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[BUGGAR]

Those are the four load types, point, triangular left, triangular right and uniform. This step routes the program to the solution for that load type.
That's what I love about Basic - you can "drive all over the country" solving things then come back to where you left with your answer.

 

[Sparweb]

Thanks
Not supported by JustBasic, which allows you to GOTO only one line number at a time.
And the ON command is only used for handling error codes in JustBasic.
Got a link for the BASIC compiler that you use?


STF

 

[3DDave]

If y'all are going for BASIC, give AutoIt a shot. It's pretty easy but offers a lot more controls than any BASIC I've seen.

(drawoh - my point is that a spreadsheet cannot be set to defend against typos without a lot more effort than spreadsheet wonks put into them. There is almost no way to create a sheet that prevents fat-fingering from causing tough-to-notice problems.)

 

[RFreund]

Can I put a quick plug in for SMath LINK. Good stuff.

EIT

http://www.HowToEngineer.com

 

[CELinOttawa]

If SMath were open source it would be my go to program...

I wonder how much money we would have to get together to bribe the creator into publically releasing his source code?!?