Polski
Go back
| Home | Polski |
|
|
|
|
| Go back | |
Reprinted from Personal Computing 4/1990, pp. 145-146. Quattro Pro: Unify and Conquer All too often software upgrades are more sizzle than steak. Not so with Quattro Pro, which advances the art of spreadsheet design. The original Quattro was a close clone of Lotus 1-2-3 Release 2.01, offering a few extra frills at a low price. But when Lotus split its market by shipping two equally priced updates to 1-2-3 Release 2.01 (1-2-3 2.2 and 3.0) it created an opportunity for a product that could provide the power of 3.0 with the modest hardware requirements of 2.2 – and Quattro Pro meets the challenge.
In a world where nearly all computer users are familiar with 1-2-3’s dated sliding bar menu, Borland offers three separate alternatives: the Quattro Pro menu tree, a 1-2-3-like sliding bar, and a version of the original Quattro menu; you choose the one you want. If you are new to spreadsheets you should stick to the new Quattro menus. They are easier to use and provide access to features that can’t be reached via the other two menu schemes. Compatibility between Lotus 1-2-3 2.01 and Quattro is very high. Every 1-2-3 2.01 macro we tried ran fine under Quattro Pro in the same or less time. One macro didn’t update the screen properly while running – but even this one calculated the same result as 1-2-3 in the end. If you stick to established 1-2-3 conventions you should also be able to write macros in Quattro that will run on 1-2-3 2.01 or 2.2. Like 1-2-3 3.0, Quattro Pro is not compatible with 1-2-3 2.0, 2.1, and 2.2 add-on programs. Anyone with conventional spreadsheet needs should not be bothered by this fact, since Quattro Pro comes with sideways printing, spreadsheet compression, advanced graphics, advanced laser printing support, and slide-show capability already built in. If your needs are specialized, you may miss the features provided by the large library of 1-2-3 compatible add-ons. The graphics capabilities of Quattro Pro are the most advanced we have seen in a spreadsheet to date. Quattro Pro’s spreadsheet publishing is a match for the high standards set by both 1-2-3 2.2 (with Allways) and Excel. Up to eight different font sizes or types can be inserted into a single spreadsheet. You can insert boxes, lines, and shaded regions and print in either landscape or portrait mode. Unfortunately, you must use page preview to see fonts proportioned on-screen, since the program is text- rather than graphics-based. As good as its spreadsheet publishing capabilities are, Quattro Pro’s charting capabilities distance it from the pack. It provides a respectable selection of graph types (Line, Bar, XY, Stacked Bar, Pie, Area, Rotated Bar, Column, High-Low, and Text), most of which can be displayed in either a 2D or 3D format. And its customizing tools compare favorably to those in dedicated charting programs.
The major feature omitted from Quattro Pro is the ability to build 3D spreadsheets like those in 1-2-3 3.0. Lotus’s three-dimensional model allows large spreadsheets to be broken into a series of smaller modules, but it soaks up lots of memory. Borland was not willing to force users to upgrade beyond 640K to add 3D capability to Quattro Pro. As an alternative, Quattro provides powerful linking capabilities that closely simulate 3D functionality. Quattro supports the display of as many as 32 tiled, stacked, or overlapping worksheets on-screen at a time. Each of these spreadsheets can be set to access data held in any other spreadsheet stored in memory or on disk. The pseudo 3D approach taken by Quattro Pro isn’t as elegant as that of 1-2-3 3.0, but it still gets the job done. Quattro Pro provides a robust query function that can pull relevant information from any file stored in Lotus 1-2-3 1A, 2.xx, Quattro 1.0, Paradox, Reflex, Symphony, or dBase (II, III Plus, and IV) format without loading the entire database into memory first. The technology Borland uses to stuff so many features into limited memory space is dubbed VROOMM (Virtual Real-Time Object-Oriented Memory Manager). Borland has broken Quattro Pro into tiny 2K to 4K objects and created a scheme that loads as many program objects as will fit. For instance, when a user is working on a large spreadsheet, Quattro swaps out more of its own code to make room for the extra data. Quattro Pro won’t put Lotus out of business anytime soon. But the program provides an attractive alternative to both 1-2-3 2.2 and 3.0. Nearly any capability in Quattro Pro can be added to 1-2-3 2.2 via add-on products (since 2.2 remains compatible with Release 2.01 add-ons). But why bother, since Quattro Pro does so much by itself? | |||
| Page added on 22nd September 2004. Copyright © 2002-2005 Marcin Wichary |
Printable version | Contact | Site map |
