Hello,
I have found a pretty big bug in excel 2003. I searched a little on
Microsoft.com and couldn't find anything published about it but I did
find a few things on the web about it. The rand() function gives bad
numbers when a lot of them are used. I ran into this problem because I
develope Financial software and we frequently use large amounts of
random number to model things. If you have 2003 make a sheet with
about 10000 calls to rand() and make them conditionally formatted that
if they are not between 1 and 0 to display background color. Then hold
down F9 key until they start showing up. It is pretty crazy. This is
going to be a pretty big problem in excel, I know a lot of fields that
use large amounts of random numbers to generate tests and models. And
here I was pulling my hair out that I was programming a simple model
wrong. :(

Keith
www.kjtfs.com


---
Message posted from http://www.ExcelForum.com/

Hi KJTFS!

This is a known bug. If you do a Google Search on RAND() you'll find
quite a lot has been written on it.

Try downloading Ron de Bruins Google Search 6.0 for easy searching
from Excel in Excel (and other) groups:

http://www.rondebruin.nl/Google.htm

--
Regards
Norman Harker MVP (Excel)
Sydney, Australia

Excel and Word Function Lists (Classifications, Syntax and Arguments)
available free to good homes.

I have added a screen shot of my computer doing it as I realize most
people probably dont have access to 2003 yet. Here are two of the same
exact spread sheets open side by side, one with the values and the
other with the formula (one is read-only).

Keith
www.kjtfs.com

Sorry I had to shrink the file to about 40% its original size.

Attachment filename: excel bug2.jpg
Download attachment: http://www.excelforum.com/attachment.php?postid=403145
---
Message posted from http://www.ExcelForum.com/