Given the ubiquity of Excel, it seems a bit silly for you to talk about a
"virtually universal" standard, isn't it?


On Tue, 03 Aug 2004 02:28:09 GMT, "Stephen J. Herschkorn"
wrote:

Dik T. Winter wrote:

In article "fred"
writes:
Do any of you SCI.MATH whizes want to weigh in on this?

Well, contrary to some responders I do not read this in an excel newsgroup
(I have no reason to read such a newsgroup...).

MS Excel calculates "=-5^2" as 25, not as -25.

Yes, that is one of the possibilities.

Can you cite one publication, not a computer langauge manual, where the
author computed -5^2 as 25? We are talking about the convention of the
end user here. If you were helping a child with the school problem to
plot y = -x^2, what you show him/her?

The fact that there are some expressions (e.g., a^b^c) where
precedence is not as standard does not negate that the standard of -x^2
is virtually universal.

"Myrna Larson" wrote...
Given the ubiquity of Excel, it seems a bit silly for you to talk about a
"virtually universal" standard, isn't it?
....

Your argument is akin to saying not everyone drives on the right hand side
of the road in the US if you choose not to. The failure of some individuals
to adhere to standards (something Microsoft has developed quite a reputation
for doing, er, not doing) doesn't alter the existence of standards, only
their enforceability.

However moot since you've deleted sci.math from the newsgroup to which you
sent your response. The person to whom you responded is likely never to see
your response.