Category:Saturn Calc: Difference between revisions

Ballistic Trajectory spreadsheet in Saturn Calc

Various Benchmarks for PDP-11s and VAXes

Functions List from Calc Help

Overview of Saturn Calc

Calc has some similarity to Lotus 1-2-3 in that it uses a / to bring up a line of command choices:

Command (A,B,C,D,E,F,G,I,M,N,O,P,R,S,T,V,W,X,Z,?):

as you use arrow keys to move the cursor over a letter an short explanation appears,

X. exit without saving worksheet Exit [No]? Y

S-enter Storage menu (to save,recall,graph, etc.). Choosing an option e.g. S, brings up a secondary menu.

Storage option (W,R,C,O,L,G,A,?): W

Name of worksheet to write: FILENAME.CAL

Commands are system functions that can change the display characteristics of values, modify the size or arrangement of the spreadsheet, and perform system operations like storage and printing of spreadsheets. They are distinguished from entries by typing </> as the first character on the prompt/edit line. The system responds by displaying the first letters of the command options. Typing the desired letter and pressing <CR> causes a prompt to appear which requests specific action. For all commands except Blank, Copy, Move, Order, and Print, this second prompt can be eliminated by specifying the action before pressing <CR>.

Pressing <PF4> or <CTRL> and <U> cancels a command before it is implemented.

A APPLY FORMULA      I INSERT                 S STORAGE
B BLANK              M MOVE                   T TITLES
C COPY               N NAME                   V VALUES
D DELETE             O ORDER (SORT)           W WINDOWS
E EDIT               P PRINT                  X EXIT
F FORMAT             R REWRAP TEXT            Z ZAP
G GLOBAL                                          

One difference from Lotus 1-2-3 is that the spreadsheet results are not calculated until you request it with ! or , These two characters are commands to recalculate the spreadsheet. This saves lots of CPU cycles for the PDP-11. Also, the calculations can run left to right row by row or left to right column by column. Sometimes a cell in for example column C use a value from column F that is not yet calculated. Hitting ! a second time is necessary in that case. Also, the number of recalculation cycles can be set by a global value as can the order of calculations.

This user interface makes it very easy to get around in Calc. Exiting a spreadsheet is /X Y or PF4. Saving is /S W filename.CAL If Filename.CAL exists, you are asked if you want to replace it. Saying yes actually saves a new version number of the file so your previous version is available as Filename.CAL;-1

The Quick Reference Guide will be your best help once you become somewhat familiar with Saturn Calc.

One great feature of Calc is the use of external .CCL command files. You can create an ascii text file that can build a spreadsheet with a .CCL file. The easiest way to see this is to use / S O Filename.CCL

Then use EDT to view the .CCL file and it is pretty easy to see how a spreadsheet could be created by BASIC or FORTRAN. The / S C filename.ccl will execute the comand file and build the spreadsheet.

CCL files can also have loops, if statements, and other elements of a programming language. It is possible to have a spreadsheet model, then use a command file to drive input values through a range and record the results of the model with the various inputs.

Here is an example .CCL file that would recreate SUMFIX.CAL if read in via

/ S O SUMFIX.CCL

>TYP SUMFIX.CCL
~\[~Q~c
~! \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* DEFINITION AND DEFAULT SETUP ~c
/ZY~C5~C10~c
/GWN~c
/GSN~c
/GOR~c
/GRM~c
/GI1~c
/GC12~c
/GF2N,ZR~c
/GAN~c
~! \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* FORMAT INFORMATION ~c
/F0TL~CA5~c
/F0TL~CA8:A9~c
/F0TR~CB4:B6~c
~! \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* FORMULAS, TEXT, OR VALUES ~c
=A1 2.00~c
=B1 3.00~c
=C1 A1\*B1~c
=D1 PUTV(GET(C1),E1)~c
=E1 6.00~c
=A2 4.00~c
=B2 5.00~c
=C2 A2\*B2~c
=D2 PUTV(GET(C2),E2)~c
=E2 20.00~c
=A3 6.00~c
=B3 7.00~c
=C3 A3\*B3~c
=D3 PUTV(GET(C3),E3)~c
=E3 42.00~c
=B4 SUM~c
=C4 SUM(E1.E3)~c
=A5 c~c
=B5 AVG~c
=C5 AVG(E1.E3)~c
=B6 STD~c
=C6 STD(E1.E3)~c
=A8 For Explanation of using SUM on calculated values~c
=A9 See SUMFIX.TXT~c
~! \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* CELL PROTECTION ~c
~! \*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* JUMP, BETWEEN COLUMN CHAR, AND PAGE STATUS ~c
/GAA~c
~N~c=A1~c

Another / S option L can load data from data files a bit like .CSV files are used. Saturn Graph .GCL files can also be created from Calc with / S G

GCL files are discussed in the Graph overview.

There are two issues when using Saturn Calc.

Saturn software doesn't understand RSX11M+ named directories so you should be in a UIC based directory when you use it. If you are in a named directory it will look for files in your protection UIC. This does not matter in RSX11M as the SET /UIC=[g,m] sets both the default directory and protection together.

The second problem involves functions that can input a range of cells like SUM, AVG, STD, STDE, MIN or MAX. When cells contain numeric values input from the keyboard, these functions work fine e.g. SUM(C1:C10). However if C1:C10 values contained calculations like A1\*B1, the C1 cell would show the correct value but a function using the range would see 0 in the cells. C1+C2+C3...+C10 would calculate a correct sum however. I came up with a work around that can be used if one really needs that functionality across ranges. See SUMFIX.DOC in the distribution for detailed info on this topic. Also, SUMFIX.CAL is a spreadsheet that illustrates the issue and the work around for it.