HP Forum Archive 21

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HP Prime - Spreadsheet obscurity Message #1 Posted by bluesun08 on 10 Nov 2013, 9:50 a.m. What is the difference between the two options when i want to name a cell "price"? 1. Format -> Name -> price 2. ="price"

Re: HP Prime - Spreadsheet obscurity Message #2 Posted by Joe Horn on 10 Nov 2013, 10:58 a.m., in response to message #1 by bluesun08 Quote: What is the difference between the two options when i want to name a cell "price"? 1. Format -> Name -> price 2. ="price" The first option ties a name to that cell, so that you can refer to it elsewhere by name instead of by row & column. E.g. If A1 is named "price" and has a value of 5.95, then you can type =price*1.08 into cell A2 and get A1's value plus 8%. The second options merely sets the value (not the name) of the cell to "price". Can't do much with that.

Re: HP Prime - Spreadsheet obscurity Message #3 Posted by bluesun08 on 10 Nov 2013, 11:20 a.m., in response to message #2 by Joe Horn o.k. thank you. that means that i basically can forget the "=" rule or is there a reasonable use of the "=" operation?

Re: HP Prime - Spreadsheet obscurity Message #4 Posted by Joe Horn on 10 Nov 2013, 7:12 p.m., in response to message #3 by bluesun08 Quote: o.k. thank you. that means that i basically can forget the "=" rule or is there a reasonable use of the "=" operation? The = matters! You need to use it whenever you want a cell to change automatically based on what other cells are doing. For example, type 100 in A1. Now type A1+5 in A2. You'll see A2 say 105, of course. But now change A1 to 200. You might expect A2 to automatically turn into 205, but it doesn't, because the expression 'A1+5' isn't stored in A2, just the result of the original calculation, which was 105. But now type =A1+5 into cell A2. Then change A1, and watch A2 automatically change. Cool, huh? Almost as much fun as VisiCalc on the HP-75! Hope that helps!

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