On 2/6/14 7:06 AM, BillW50 wrote:
"Ken Springer" wrote in message
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On 2/5/14 2:47 PM, BillW50 wrote:
"VanguardLH" wrote in message
...
BillW50 wrote:

snip

Why are people creating tables on a word processor? Why not use a
spreadsheet?

It depends on what your goal is with the table.

I think people tend to lose sight of the purpose of a spreadsheet.
It's for the purpose manipulating numbers, doing math operations of
some type. It's not for manipulating text.

You're right, but on the other hand, I think some lost sight what tables
are for. And while spreadsheets are manipulating numbers, databases are
for manipulating text and/or numbers.

"manipulating text and/or numbers"... You've lost me there with that
phrase. How do you "manipulate" text? I can sort of see it with numbers.

If say you are running a computer
review for example, why are they using tables to just control the left
and right margins of the paragraphs?

Assuming your review is simply a text article, I wouldn't use a table at
all. Possibly for a pull quote, but I'd more than likely use a text box
there.

My uses of tables would be more for presenting information in a... At a
loss for a descriptor here. LOL

For instance, I have document listing different types of scholarships
(music, engineering, scientific) in one column of the table, where to
apply for it in the second column, and the web page hyperlink in the
third column. But the formatting does look like a spreadsheet layout.
It's constantly changing, or was as the project is in languish mode, and
is small enough that using spreadsheet to do the ever changing updates
would take more time than just doing it in Word/Libre Office/????????
tables. And, I can sort the data as I wish.

There is one case where I would use a spreadsheet, although I've never
had the reason to do so. I have to prepare a report to somebody about
the financial portion of some project. But, as I do the report, all the
numbers needed for the report are not available. In the spreadsheet,
I'd put the relevant data where calculations can be done as the data
comes in, with the results being dynamic in this case. The "bottom
line" of all these calculation goes into the report. I'd create the
"bottom line" part of the spreadsheet as a linked object into the text
document so that as new information comes in and is entered into the
spreadsheet, the changes to the "bottom line" are automatically updated
in the text document.

In your preferred spreadsheet, can you insert a graphic/image into a
cell? In a Libre Office spreadsheet, you can insert a graphic/image,
but it's free floating, it's not inserted into the cell itself. Which
you might want if you were using LO Writer to create a table for a
basic HTML page.

In Writer and Word, the image is inserted into the table cell. Change
the size, shape, location of the table and/or cell, and the image
moves with it. Doing the same in an LO spreadsheet, the image stays
put. You have to manually reposition that image.

I'm sure there are other differences, but this one comes to mind. And
doing something like this that doesn't require a math component is
simply extra steps you have to do to get that table into the text
document, plus the extra time to edit that table info.

You know, some word processors has features of basic spreadsheet and
database use. Even though these features might be there, I wouldn't call
them very useful except for the lightest of uses.

Years ago, I experimented with the spreadsheet function of a table in
Word. Can't remember which version, but 2003 or previous. The cell
names were the antiquated R1C1 for the upper left cell, not A1 as we are
used to these days.

Never played with a database feature of a word processor. Or, at least,
not knowingly! LOL

You know I save lots of computers articles over the years. My most used
format is in plain text. As it is the most transportable format of all.
But when it just isn't practical, I'll use RTF, DOC, HTML, or even
MHTML. And most of the time I see tables used in docs, it was totally
unnecessary.

For the copies I'm going to share, I use PDF. And save the original in
native format for the program.


--
Ken

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