>>>> in VBA you'd have to write an explicit FOR loop 
>>>
>>> Not in Excel. What are you smoking? :-)
>>
>> Really? Care to explain that one?
> 
> Off the top of my head:
> 
> =product(range)^(1/count(range))
> 
> ...unless there is some geometric mean function, I didn't search for one.

Ah. In other words, "you don't need to code this because it's already 
pre-defined".

Or, to put it another way, I picked a bad example. ;-)

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> Ah. In other words, "you don't need to code this because it's already 
> pre-defined".
>
> Or, to put it another way, I picked a bad example. ;-)

Or, a lot of what you might want to do in a spreadsheet is pre-defined :-)

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>> Or, to put it another way, I picked a bad example. ;-)
> 
> Or, a lot of what you might want to do in a spreadsheet is pre-defined :-)

Or, I use a spreadsheet in a way that's very different to how normal 
people use them.

(E.g., Excel doesn't provide a "convolution" function. And it would be 
far too hard to implement one in VBA. Not because the algorithm is hard, 
but because I'd have to figure out how to access the cells of the 
spreadsheet...)

I tend to use Excel as a function plotter - and it's annoying that 
things like an FFT are so hard to do.

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47d7d30f$1@news.povray.org...

> I tend to use Excel as a function plotter - and it's annoying that things 
> like an FFT are so hard to do.

The built-in FFT in Excel doesn't work?
In any case, accessing cells with VBA is basic. Just start recording a macro 
and put something in a cell to see how it's done.

G.

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> Not because the algorithm is hard, 
> but because I'd have to figure out how to access the cells of the 
> spreadsheet...)

Oh my God.

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scott wrote:
>> Not because the algorithm is hard, but because I'd have to figure out 
>> how to access the cells of the spreadsheet...)
> 
> Oh my God.

I know...

What can I say? VB isn't exactly the easiest programming language ever. 
And this stuff isn't really documented anywhere. (Sure, there's an 
online help system that will tell you what function X does. But if you 
don't know the name of the function you need... that's not much help.)

Now you see why it took me several hours to write a VB macro that puts 
today's date into a particular cell?

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>> I tend to use Excel as a function plotter - and it's annoying that things 
>> like an FFT are so hard to do.
> 
> The built-in FFT in Excel doesn't work?

Excell has an FFT? Since when? (Or is it in one of the non-default add-ins?)

> In any case, accessing cells with VBA is basic. Just start recording a macro 
> and put something in a cell to see how it's done.

I didn't realise that uses VB. Oh, wait, I'm thinking about Access...

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> And this stuff isn't really documented anywhere.

Rubbish!

Try looking up "range" or "cells" or "worksheet" in the object browser and 
reading the help.  It even gives examples, like (these are from the help on 
the "range" keyword, the others are similar):

Worksheets("Sheet1").Range("A5").Value = 
Worksheets("Sheet1").Range("A1").Value

Worksheets("Sheet1").Activate
Range("A1:H8").Formula = "=Rand()"    'Range is on the active sheet

Worksheets(1).Cells(1, 1).Value = 24

ActiveSheet.Cells(2, 1).Formula = "=Sum(B1:B5)"

How could it be any more clear what to do?  Or, as Gilles said, record a 
macro and then look at the code (and the help related to the code 
generated) - a nice trick for learning how to do lots of things in Excel 
(like creating charts, changing borders, sorting etc).

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47d7e009$1@news.povray.org...
>>> I tend to use Excel as a function plotter - and it's annoying that 
>>> things like an FFT are so hard to do.
>>
>> The built-in FFT in Excel doesn't work?
>
> Excell has an FFT? Since when? (Or is it in one of the non-default 
> add-ins?)

It's in the Analysis Toolpak which is not turned on by default (but just a 
checkbox away).
http://www.maxim-ic.com/appnotes.cfm/an_pk/3292

It's been there for years I believe (the Analysis Toolpak has been there 
since Excel 95 at least, I'm not sure about FFT itself).

> I didn't realise that uses VB. Oh, wait, I'm thinking about Access...

I don't understand what you're saying... The entire Office suite uses VBA. 
Actually that's one big selling point of Office (for businesses): one can 
automate all the Office applications using the same language and have them 
interact with each other.

G.

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>> Excell has an FFT? Since when? (Or is it in one of the non-default 
>> add-ins?)
> 
> It's in the Analysis Toolpak which is not turned on by default (but just a 
> checkbox away).

Ah, right. I don't think I have that installed... (But as you say, 
that's not hard to fix.)

I hope it's less clunky than that hacked-in complex number "support" 
Excell has though.

>> I didn't realise that uses VB. Oh, wait, I'm thinking about Access...
> 
> I don't understand what you're saying... The entire Office suite uses VBA.

Yes. But Access has an additional "macro language" that only Access 
uses. By default it seems to record macros with that.

> Actually that's one big selling point of Office (for businesses): one can 
> automate all the Office applications using the same language and have them 
> interact with each other.

Heh. I'm *so* not trying that... ;-)

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