Date: prev next · Thread: first prev next last
2012 Archives by date, by thread · List index


Hi Italo,

please have a look at
http://wiki.services.openoffice.org/wiki/Documentation/How_Tos/Calc:_Functions_listed_by_category
and
http://wiki.services.openoffice.org/wiki/Documentation/How_Tos/Calc:_Functions_listed_alphabetically

Those indexes are needed in the help.

Italo Vignoli schrieb:
I have tried to figure out the thinking behind the Calc Functions Help,
but after a couple of days I have given up because it looks impossible
to understand.

Basically, the problems are the following:

1. Functions are not listed alphabetically. Does it make sense? Does it
make sense to swap them inside the file to create al alphabetical order
(which is the usual order for human beings)?

Both kind of indexes are needed, see the above mentioned Wiki-pages. In the help an alphabetic index of spreadsheet functions is missing.


2. Size of files is wildly different. There are huge files like Math
Functions and small files like Financial Functions which are even split
in sections (where the contents do not follow any order, while it would
be more useful to have - for instance - "Financial Functions A-L"
instead of "Financial Functions Part One"). Does it make sense to split
large files to make them more manageable? Does it make sense to rename
sections to make them like these: A-L and M-Z?

I find the splitting in "Part One", "Part Two" ... very unhandy, because I always need to look in all parts to find a function, when searching inside the help. Grouping of functions are meaningful, when they are easily confused, for example LOOKUP and MATCH. But in most cases I prefer a one function - one file structure together with an index. But unfortunately that would end up in more then 400 files. So some grouping seems to be necessary.

I personally would prefer to have an alphabetic order inside the statistical functions. But a thematic order might be useful too, if the topic is mentioned in the header. "Part One", "Part Two"... are useless. For an example of a thematic structure look at the violet part on bottom of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistics.


(Of course, this does not mean that I already know how to split help
files or to create new help files... but it might be worth studying it
if it makes sense to improve the overall usability of the help, which is
now almost useless in several areas).

I agree. But even a more precise description like those linked in http://wiki.services.openoffice.org/wiki/Documentation/How_Tos/Calc:_Functions_listed_alphabetically does not help all users. There are examples missing, from which the user can decide, whether that function is useful in his case. The problem is, that such a help with useful examples would be to large to be provided as in-build help. Such help needs to go to the Wiki.

Even the pure description might be to complex to be shown in the in-build help. For example see my description in http://wiki.services.openoffice.org/wiki/Documentation/How_Tos/Calc:_CHISQDIST_function


3. There are<comments>  like "see also TANG". Does it make sense to make
these comments, which might sometimes be useful, be visible to end
users? In my opinion, having this kind of stuff buried into XML and
invisible to the end user does not make sense, so either I uncomment it
making it visible to end user or I delete it (I feel that the first
option is the best one).

Are those comments inserted to help translators to get a consistent translation for cognate functions?


Sorry for the length. Ciao, Italo

Perhaps more a topic for documentation@global.libreoffice.org than for libreoffice@lists.freedesktop.org

Kind regards
Regina



Context


Privacy Policy | Impressum (Legal Info) | Copyright information: Unless otherwise specified, all text and images on this website are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. This does not include the source code of LibreOffice, which is licensed under the Mozilla Public License (MPLv2). "LibreOffice" and "The Document Foundation" are registered trademarks of their corresponding registered owners or are in actual use as trademarks in one or more countries. Their respective logos and icons are also subject to international copyright laws. Use thereof is explained in our trademark policy.