GENERAL format explanation [was Re: Gnumeric 1.1.90 comments]

[Patrick <pabos glypsube org>]

On Fri, 2003-09-12 at 12:25, Jody Goldberg wrote:
> On Thu, Sep 11, 2003 at 06:56:08PM -0700, Patrick wrote:
> > (2) What is a GENERAL format anyway? Is it really the same thing as
> > implying that Gnumeric will automatically format it as appropriate?
>
> Not really.  Its actually fairly tricky.  Gnumeric handles this a lot
> better than OO.  Its a nop for strings and errors, but for numeric
> content it tries to display as much information as possible given
> the available space.  eg it will switch to scientific notation when
> things shrink.  Things with format General should be a lot more
> resistant to the '#######'

Ok, that is interesting. Thanks.