Numerous statistical and graphical problems have been reported for different versions of Microsoft Excel, including the newest version (Excel 2007). We report newly discovered problemswith Excel 2007when generating polynomial trend line equations, having a userspecified (forced) intercept, from graphed data. We also remind users of Excel’s Trendline function of problems with Excel 2003 that hav...

Here I present an Excel based program for the analysis of intracellular Ca transients recorded using fluorescent indicators. The program can perform all the necessary steps which convert recorded raw voltage changes into meaningful physiological information. The program performs two fundamental processes. (1) It can prepare the raw signal by several methods. (2) It can then be used to analyze t...

We provide an assessment of the statistical distributions in Microsoft r © Excel versions 97 through 2007 along with two competing spreadsheet programs, namely Gnumeric 1.7.11 and OpenOffice.org Calc 2.3.0. We find that the accuracy of various statistical functions in Excel 2007 range from unacceptably bad to acceptable but significantly inferior in comparison to alternative implementations. In...

Microsoft attempted to implement theWichmann–Hill RNG in Excel 2003 and failed; it did not just produce numbers between zero andunity, itwould also produce negative numbers. Microsoft issued a patch that allegedly fixed the problem so that the patched Excel 2003 and Excel 2007 now implement the Wichmann–Hill RNG, as least according to Microsoft. We show thatwhatever RNG it is thatMicrosoft has ...

Excel 2007, like its predecessors, fails a standard set of intermediate-level accuracy tests in three areas: statistical distributions, random number generation, and estimation. Additional errors in specific Excel procedures are discussed.Microsoft’s continuing inability to correctly fix errors is discussed. No statistical procedure in Excel should be used until Microsoft documents that the pro...

This article considers which activities in teaching statistics may be suitable candidates for the application of spreadsheets, and whether spreadsheets in general and Excel 2007 in particular are suitable for these tasks. © 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The aim of this paper is to review a published paper, ‘Using computer software packages to enhance the teaching of Engineering Management Science: Part 1 –Critical path networks’. Excel in Microsoft Office 2007 was discovered to be able to solve critical path network problems with some programming. The capabilities of the two previously evaluated packages, Microsoft Project 2007 and Quantitativ...