Beaminster — Oct 3rd 2017

A small attendance, unusual for Beaminster. Just 9 people came to hear a about first of all the background to spreadsheets - what they were originally used for and by whom, then the advent of VisiCalc back in 1979, designed to run on the Apple ][, predecessor to the Mac, which brought a revolution to the way computer programs worked inasmuch as things were no longer done in a linear fashion, but in several directions at once. This program changed the perception of the small computer (as compared to the monster machines occupying huge air-conditioned rooms) from a hobbyists toy to a business tool. It also boosted the sales of the Apple ][ computer.

Michael explained the basic principle of a spreadsheet - the way in which a formulae referring top the contents of other cells in the spreadsheet would produce a result in the selected cell, and which would change instantly in alteration was made to one or more of the cells being referred to.

After that there was a shortcut through the different templates available in the Template Chooser, from basic spreadsheet vis checklists to Baby Records and Holiday Planners, with multiple sheets covering different areas (for example your itinerary in one, your reservation details in another, the costs of the holiday in a third and so on, all with graphics to suit) and similar Baby Records, ideal for doting grannies to fill in, and on to the use of spreadsheets as a basic database. The various types of graphs that can, very easily, be made in Numbers showed how more comprehensible numbers can be when shown in one of these forms.

All in all the presentation showed that there is a lot more to Numbers than one might have expected!

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