Patched Excel Has Math Issues
- By Peter Varhol
- 03/18/2008
One inadvertent result of the
set
of patches that Microsoft released for Office last week was that Excel 2003
returns
an incorrect value when used in conjunction with Real Time Data source.
Microsoft has acknowledged the problem and is working on a fix. The bug shows
up when configured using a VBA macro for external data acquisition. As a temporary
workaround, Microsoft suggested that users run any function containing a VBA
macro using a Real Time Data source on each cell individually.
Few of us use Excel as a data acquisition tool, and this doesn't sound like
an embarrassing math-error issue as much as it sounds like a straightforward
bug. But such bugs might make users less likely to use Excel for tasks where
accuracy
is important.
What about you? Are you comfortable using Excel for important math calculations?
Let me know at [email protected].
Microsoft Pays for Rapt Attention
Microsoft announced late last week an agreement to acquire
Rapt, a Web advertising price and availability company located in San Francisco.
Rapt software and services enable Web advertising suppliers to track and price
inventory effectively. What this means is that in a world where the amount of
available Web advertising space and how much it costs is always changing, Rapt
brings together buyer and seller with equivalent information.
This acquisition, while small, nicely complements Microsoft's purchase of aQuantive
last year. It looks like Microsoft is serious about making a push in Web advertising,
and is willing to go outside the company to buy critical parts.
Do you think advertising should be such an important part of Microsoft's future
strategy? Or should the company focus on its traditional user base. Send your
opinion to [email protected].
OpenSpan Opens Up to Web Services
OpenSpan recently announced the OpenSpan
Platform SOA Desktop Edition, a new release that enables the product to
connect with Web services in addition to standalone applications. In addition,
the resulting integration itself can be called as a Web service by still other
applications.
OpenSpan offers a means to easily mine internal interfaces to common desktop
applications, and use those interfaces to integrate data and processes from
different applications into a custom workflow.
Are there applications you wish you could connect together? Tell me about them
at [email protected].
BeyondTrust Offers Free Privilege
Management Tool
BeyondTrust today announced Application
Rights Auditor, a free product that automatically identifies and reports
the Windows applications that require users to have elevated rights in order
to use an application or certain features within an application.
You can download this tool at no charge from the BeyondTrust
Web site. It complements the company's Privilege Manager product, while
allowing you to easily manage user privileges across a set of applications without
administrator intervention.
Do you have difficulty managing trust and privilege in a Vista environment?
Tell my why at [email protected].
About the Author
Peter Varhol is the executive editor,
reviews of Redmond magazine and has more than 20 years of experience as a software
developer, software product manager and technology writer. He has graduate degrees
in computer science and mathematics, and has taught both subjects at the university
level.