GreenTree
11-16-2008, 10:59 PM
I'm using VBA to create spreadsheets that others will open & use. Some of these users have various versions of Excel, while some use Open Office to view & manipulate the spreadsheets. For the most part, keeping things widely compatible hasn't been too difficult, but I've found one issue that's a doozy: comments.
When I comment a cell, with the comment not "visible" (i.e. not visible full time, but only when the user hovers over it with the cursor), I'm not in control of where the comment shows up. Excel decides, and on the whole that's okay. It may be necessary to scroll a bit to see the entire comment, but it shows up reasonably close to the commented cell. If I make the comment "visible" (i.e. visible full time), I can specify a location for it, but as soon as I make it no longer visible, my specified location is forgotten & it reappears in "the" location -- the one Excel chooses for it. Okay, that's livable. (And, for the number of commented cells I have, full time visible for everything won't work. More screen real estate would be needed for the comments than is used by the rest of the spreadsheet!)
HOWEVER, when I open the same spreadsheet in Open Office Calc to check for compatibility, the comment is FAR, FAR away from the cell. As in, I make it visible, then scroll several Page Down's and a couple screens to the right before I see it. However, when I move the comment to a more reasonable location, I can make it no longer visible, and when I hover over it, it appears in the same spot that I've moved it to, unlike Excel. So, hidden or not, there is a "position" value in Open Office that persists.
It would be *really* nice if the comments I use (many hundreds of them) in the produced spreadsheets were as available to the Open Office users (i.e. they pop-up reasonably near the commented cell, not requiring absurd amounts of scrolling to go see) as they are to the Excel users, but I'm at a loss how to make that happen. Does anyone have experience with Open Office & comments that might shed even a bit of light on this?
Many thanks,
G.T. :banghead: :banghead:
When I comment a cell, with the comment not "visible" (i.e. not visible full time, but only when the user hovers over it with the cursor), I'm not in control of where the comment shows up. Excel decides, and on the whole that's okay. It may be necessary to scroll a bit to see the entire comment, but it shows up reasonably close to the commented cell. If I make the comment "visible" (i.e. visible full time), I can specify a location for it, but as soon as I make it no longer visible, my specified location is forgotten & it reappears in "the" location -- the one Excel chooses for it. Okay, that's livable. (And, for the number of commented cells I have, full time visible for everything won't work. More screen real estate would be needed for the comments than is used by the rest of the spreadsheet!)
HOWEVER, when I open the same spreadsheet in Open Office Calc to check for compatibility, the comment is FAR, FAR away from the cell. As in, I make it visible, then scroll several Page Down's and a couple screens to the right before I see it. However, when I move the comment to a more reasonable location, I can make it no longer visible, and when I hover over it, it appears in the same spot that I've moved it to, unlike Excel. So, hidden or not, there is a "position" value in Open Office that persists.
It would be *really* nice if the comments I use (many hundreds of them) in the produced spreadsheets were as available to the Open Office users (i.e. they pop-up reasonably near the commented cell, not requiring absurd amounts of scrolling to go see) as they are to the Excel users, but I'm at a loss how to make that happen. Does anyone have experience with Open Office & comments that might shed even a bit of light on this?
Many thanks,
G.T. :banghead: :banghead: