Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!NEXTASY2.EECS.WSU.EDU!dwatola From: dwatola@NEXTASY2.EECS.WSU.EDU (David Watola) Newsgroups: comp.sys.next Subject: Improv API and related complaints Message-ID: <9103310744.AA09707@nextasy2.eecs.wsu.edu> Date: 31 Mar 91 07:45:40 GMT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Lines: 44 X-Unparsable-Date: Sat, 30 Mar 91 23:44:57 GMT-5632:48 R. Antony comments: >>[stuff about Improv deleted] >>What the developers can and should do is to provide hooks >>to which 3-rd party develpers and users can attach >>a custom plotting module. >>Why nobody has such a thing? > >If you would care to read the release notes to Improv, you would find >that Lotus did exactly that. Just go ahead and order your API disk. i really don't think the API will be quite that flexible. if you use appinspector or gdb to look at the remote messaging functions supported by presentation builder, you get just about the same functionality as you get from the inspector panel. in any case, this API disk is vaporware... the release note makes it sound like all you have to do is pick up the phone and you've got your API disk in a week. i called lotus and they said it was not available-they would send me a postscard describing it (wonderful). john corey from next told me they don't have it either. in general, i think improv is pretty slick. but i also believe lotus is so smug about their revolutionary spreadsheet interface that they don't see how they have crippled the program with some of their limitations. for all its ease of use, it is certainly not as functional as 123. easy-to-use formulas are not as good as macros. hell, you can't write a decent LIFE simulation using improv :( ok, sure, spreadsheets were originally intended for financial crapola. but i seriously doubt that financial planning constitutes the majority of 123's use across the country. Face it, 123 gets used for EVERYTHING under the sun. more arbitrary limitations: how come i can't plot 2000 data points? why can't i get decent x-y plots (rather than just scatter plots--i want connected lines). how come when i do scatter plots i have to have those HUGE symbols at my data points? etc. etc. etc. i suppose i can't complain too loudly though. it was free. i certainly wouldn't pay any money for it, though. originally intended for financial analysis, but it has grown beyond that. 123 is a general-purpose tool with a lot of power--i know of one MAJOR engineeering/manufacturing company that uses it to handle vast amounts of production data and perform statistical analyses... there are just some silly arbitrary limitations imposed by lotus on improv's capabilities.