More often, however, an argument is a value that you enter manually, or one already entered in a cell or range of cells on the spreadsheet.
In some cases, the arguments will have pre-defined choices, and you may need to refer to the online help to understand them. As user, your job is to enter the arguments needed to run the function. These arguments may or may not have their own name. For instance, SUM, which adds arguments, can also be entered as + while PRODUCTION, which multiplies arguments, can also be entered as *.Įach function has a number of arguments used in the calculations. By tradition, functions are entered entirely in upper case letters, although Calc will read them correctly if they are in lower or mixed case, too.Ī few basic functions are also represented by symbols. For instance, the FV function gives the future value of an investment, while BIN2HEX converts a binary number to a hexadecimal number. Typically, the name of a function is an abbreviated description of what the function does. Alternatively, it may be as complex as calculating the standard deviation of a sample, or a hyperbolic tangent of a number. A function may be as simple as adding two numbers together, or finding the average of a list of numbers. Many of these functions are for use with numbers, but many others are used with dates and times, or even text. Then, in Part 2, I'll talk about how to work with them, and give some examples of what they can do.Ĭalc includes over 350 functions to help you analyze and reference data. In Part 1 of this article, I'll give a brief overview of functions and how they operate. If you understand functions, then you can start to use the real power of a spreadsheet. Beginners might be content to use Calc for lists, but, for advanced users, functions are the main reason for spreadsheets. All you have to do is add the arguments, and the calculation is automatically made for you. A function is a pre-defined calculation entered in a cell to help you analyze or manipulate data in a spreadsheet.
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