Re: [libreoffice-users] database or spreadsheet

On Wed, 2012-02-08 at 08:34 +0100, Stefan Weigel wrote:
> Hi Drew,

Halo Stephen,

Before we start in earnest.

This was an outlying case as far as I'm concerned, not the norm here.

But that said, we learn usually from looking at those situations where
things didn't go quite as expected. That is my motivation for getting
into this.

> Am 08.02.2012 00:32, schrieb drew:
>
> > The user asked how to rename sheets in Calc - end of story.
>
> But the beginning of the story is, that the user, before asking this
> question, first described an unfortunate way of holding data, which
> is the reason why he needs to rename a big number of sheets.

Not quite - but let's start from when he did put specificity to his
question. 

He has sheets named for each month, 12 sheets.

He uses the tool (a spreadsheet) in a way that works for him.

A spreadsheet made by himself for himself.

> Sometimes you serve better if you do not *only* answer the question.

Agreed that is often the case. 

However it was not a case of extending the answer to his question,
rather the very first thing out of everyones mouth was: You are wrong,
when he disagreed (surprise) -then- You are stupid.

> > If you don't want to answer that question, then don't answer - but don't
> > open the door and show him two young men in white shirts offering to
> > save his soul..
> >
> > or - answer his, perfectly valid, question first and then offer the
> > sermon, but what he got was a sermon and no answer to his question.
>
> That´s not true. 

> There were several suggestions how to rename the
> sheets. *You* even "translated" an Excel macro for him. So how can
> you say, no answer was given?

Yup I did - and Andreas expanded on it - my statements, and I would
think you recognize, dealt with the exchanges up to that moment.

My real point is this - look at how that went, and IMO, it could have
gone much better, again IMO, with only one change - address the question
first and then expand on it - if the user wants to expand on it.

Remember please this was not a question of a user saying - my data or my
work is a mess, quite the contrary, he just asked if there was a way to
easily automate something, in a process that otherwise works for him.

That's all I'm getting at.

Best wishes,

//drew


-- 
For unsubscribe instructions e-mail to: users+help@global.libreoffice.org
Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/
Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette
List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/global/users/
All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted