You keep printing the statement that Dan Bricklin wrote the first spreadsheet program ("The 20 Most Important People," September). No doubt VisiCalc was the first successful commercial spreadsheet, but hardly the first spreadsheet. In the early '70s, I used a mainframe program called Omnitab II, from what was then the National Bureau of Standards. It used a fully developed spreadsheet metaphor, but given the scientific and engineering emphasis of the program, it was referred to as a "lab notebook." The mathematical facility was extensive and accurate. It had a macro language, and it produced graphical output. In short, it had all the attributes of the modern spreadsheet program.
Steve Tedder
stedder@tulsix.utulsa.edu
Flexible C++
Matthew Wilson
My approach to software engineering is far more pragmatic than it
is
theoretical--and no language better exemplifies this than C++.
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Not the First Spreadsheet
