Re: [office-comment] ODFF: XIRR

[Sheldon Britton <sab_orion@verizon.net>]

Hello David,

Re: "Dennis E. Hamilton's question to you.."

If I may, I would be please to refer to the following sources which may 
be in a position of authority with regards to the "/*financial analysis 
functionality et al*/" that were mentioned by Dennis E. Hamilton in his 
email to you. These sources are as follows:-

   1. *The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB)*.

       http://www.iadb.org

   2. *The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO)*.

       http://www.unido.org/index.php?id=o3470

I sincerely trust that these sources are most welcome and may be in a 
position to provide the information sought by the respective committees 
concerned with the approval of "ODF definitions of operations, including 
OpenFormula functions".

Have a very pleasant day.

Kindest regards,

Sheldon A. Britton
 
> David,
>
> Allow me to echo Rob's sentiment.  I find your questions and comments very
> useful and something to think about.
>
> I do have a question for you, although I appreciate that your attention has
> moved to other matters.
>
> Here's my question: Can you recommend authoritative sources that establish
> the principles that are behind certain functions, especially in financial
> analysis, treatment of securities and accounts, and so on, that should be
> referenced for guidance of those who want to implement appropriate functions
> in electronic spreadsheets and their formulas?  I'm particularly interested
> in rules that are used in accounting and financial practice, and the
> authoritative sources of those rules.  I'm concerned that we have
> authoritative subject-matter expertise for citation and also comparison with
> what various programs do.  
>
> Any advice that you have would be very welcome.  I invite you to discuss
> this further on the office-user list, saving the -comment list for comments
> that are specific to the ODF definitions of operations, including
> OpenFormula functions.
>
> Regards,
>
>  - Dennis
>
>
> Dennis E. Hamilton
> ------------------
> NuovoDoc: Design for Document System Interoperability 
> mailto:Dennis.Hamilton@acm.org | gsm:+1-206.779.9430 
> http://NuovoDoc.com http://ODMA.info/dev/ http://nfoWorks.org 
>
> PS: The concern behind my question -
>
> My sense is that the work on spreadsheet formulas is conducted by software
> developers and others with much insight around computation.   It seems to me
> that the basis for definition and formulas is often derived from what other
> software does (or is thought to do), often with considerable ingenuity.  
>
> My concern is that we risk resolving our concerns for standardization by
> consultation of software and various practices without understanding the
> domain of practice in the world of users, treating the problem as simply one
> of getting software to align.
>
> I appreciate that software implementations raise edge cases that may or may
> not represent real-life situations but which need a predictable
> computational result anyhow.  It might be useful to take those cases back to
> the appropriate authorities for resolution or at least confirmation that
> they are not of concern.  [I am reminded that the work to create
> tournament-caliber chess-playing programs led to requests for clarification
> of the international rules of the game and the rules were updated to clarify
> how certain unusual conditions were to be adjudicated in both human and
> computer play.]
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: robert_weir@us.ibm.com [mailto:robert_weir@us.ibm.com] 
> http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/office-comment/200809/msg00015.html
> Sent: Monday, September 08, 2008 06:14
> To: office-comment@lists.oasis-open.org
> Subject: Re: [office-comment] ODFF: XIRR
>
> "David King" <openoffice@drking.plus.com> wrote on 09/07/2008 11:46:43 PM:
>
>   
>> I've worried that my contribution on this list has been rather 
>> fulsome, to the point of 'noise', and I was intimating that 
>> things would be a bit quieter ;)
>>
>>     
>
> Hi David,
>
> I certainly have found your review and contributions valuable.  Since the 
> ODF TC is still a bit behind on responding to public comments in general 
> you probably will not receive a detailed response for another couple of 
> months.  But getting the financial function definitions clear and correct 
> is critical for ODF 1.2.  So we will be acting on your comments, once we 
> get to them.
>
> Regards,
>
> -Rob
>
>
>
>