Microsoft Excel Fails Math Test

[Paul Zimmermann <Paul.Zimmermann@xxxxxxxx>]

Surely most of you already know...

------- Start of forwarded message -------
Microsoft Excel Fails Math Test

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: September 28, 2007
Filed at 12:14 p.m. ET

SEATTLE (AP) -- Microsoft Corp.'s Excel 2007
spreadsheet program is going to have to relearn part
of its multiplication table.

In a blog post, Microsoft employee David Gainer said
that when computer users tried to get Excel 2007 to
multiply some pairs of numbers and the result was
65,535, Excel would incorrectly display 100,000 as the
answer.

Gainer said Excel makes mistakes multiplying 77.1 by
850, 10.2 by 6,425 and 20.4 by 3,212.5, but the
program appears to be able to handle 16,383.75 times
4.

''Further testing showed a similar phenomenon with
65,536 as well,'' Gainer wrote Tuesday.

He said Excel was actually performing the calculations
correctly, but when it comes time to show the answer
on the screen, it messes up.

Gainer said the bug is limited to six numbers from
65,534.99999999995 to 65,535, and six numbers from
65,535.99999999995 to 65,536, and that Microsoft is
working hard to fix the problem.

- ------

On the Net:

http://blogs.msdn.com/excel
------- End of forwarded message -------