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I hate to admit it and I'm dating myself, but before IBM invented a PC
and about the time Bill Gates was dropping out of college to write
MS/DOS, I was filling out spreadsheets by hand in accounting classes.
They had nothing to do with computers. They were wide peices of paper
with about a zillion tiny columns so that an accountant could place all
the data side-by-side when consolidating it and preparing financial
reports such as a P&L, Balance Sheet, Income Statement, and the rest of
the normal end of year reports. The calculators used spit out long
narrow paper ribbons. They were called worksheets because they were used
to tally the accounts and make necessary adjustments and it was a lot of
tedious work to fill them out. Even a Mom'n'Pop store usually required
more than one worksheet. They were clipped, stabled, or otherwise bound
into workbooks.
Every nickel spent on developing computers -- main frame, mini, or micro
-- that would do spreadsheets was money well spent. IMHO VisiCalc and
its decendents are the best thing produced by the computer revolution.
Even better than word processors, DTP tools, and graphics programs.
John Gilger
Senior Technical Writer
Acres Gaming, Inc.
702.914.5585
========================
Spreadsheets existed well before any pc-based uber-calculator came
along.
Accountancy almost single-handedly fueled mini-computer development.
These
mini's were custom hardware/software solutions (until Wang made big
inroads
in providing std hardware) that produced a report that existed for
accountants well before computers - a spreadsheet. Borrowing from the
'spreads' used in general publishing terms, it was a broad sheet
printout
containing a particular view of the business.
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