Apache OpenOffice (AOO) Bugzilla – Issue 100624
Allow to switch off "Edit in Cell"
Last modified: 2013-12-28 20:53:29 UTC
"Edit in Cell" as the only option is WRONG. There is a basic problem with the edit in cell concept. Background: I have extensive experience in all worksheet programs. From SuperCalc64, Lotus, Excel, etc. All of them, as Open Office Calc (OOC) does, include an edit line in the task-bar (called formula bar in OOC), to provide space for editing formulas and text included in a cell. It was provided as a means to be able to edit cells that contained data bigger than the actual size of the cell. In the beginning, the cell was edited in place, but never covered other cells, it was limited to the size of the cell itself. That was a problem at the time as editing a long formula while being able to see only a small part of it was quite tricky. Long time ago as well, the idea of an edit bar was incorporated to the spreadsheets to ease the pain with long formulas. It improved with time to allow editing formulas with more than one line. Later, the idea of "editing in cell" was introduced as an improvement. It intended to make easier for users to see what they were editing. It came with an option to disallow it globally, which was available in the edit options. I always choose to disallow it. Now, OOC has "edit in cell" as the only metod available. As I get easily into complex and long formulas, I really need to use the edit bar for what it was created, not this "edit in place" concept that covers the formulas I am trying to edit. Problems it creates: Mainly, the cell contents itself cover the other cells making it, once again, awkward to edit long formulas. Also, if all cells are being edited in place, what's the need for a formula bar? It does help with short text or short formulas, as it is easier to see the changes in place. A possible workaround in OOC: Move the cell to an empty space, where the text/formula of the cell could expand freely. Very annoying to move the cell out to edit, and move it back to where it was. Steps to reproduce: 1.- Open the attached worksheet. 2.- Edit any blue cell (F2, double click, click on the edit bar). 3.- The last referenced cell is blocked by the editing window. Note: I can provide many more "real" examples of how anoying this "feature" is. Recomended action: Provide a way to disallow this editing window, if needed.
Created attachment 61235 [details] Edit in place Bug,
I checked with "Ooo Dev 3.2.0 multilingual version English UI WIN XP: [DEV300m44 (Build 9395)]" and can confirm the reported effect I see, sometimes it might be more useful to see the affected cells than to see the complete formula affecting those cells. Issue 96698 seems to be concerning the same problem, but here the reasons for the request are more plausible. User experience team should decide.
*** Issue 96698 has been marked as a duplicate of this issue. ***
Add option if the formula is obscuring the referenced cells it should be displayed in input line only.