Import sheet with named ranges

[andrew3691]

I work for a small business producing parts for the elevator industry. I am using LibreOffice 3.4.4 on Linux Mint 12, 64 bit and I have the following problem:

DESCRIPTION
For each order I create a Calc file. I import sheets into this file sheets from other template files. There are several different kinds of sheet that can be imported. They are used to do things like keep a list of all the items making up the order and to calculate the price of the order. In some of these files I use named ranges

PROBLEM
I import a sheet that contains references to named ranges in some of its cells from a document in which these named ranges are defined, into an order-document which already contains (other) named ranges. An example of this would be when I have already imported the order-contents list into an order-document and then import the price calculation sheet into the same document. Both the order-contents list and the price calculation sheets contain references to named ranges which are defined in their respective template files.

After I have imported the second sheet (The price calculation sheet in my example), these references in the cells of the imported sheet no longer point to the correct named ranges. Instead they point to named ranges on the first sheet that I imported into the order-document (the order-contents list in my example). The sheet, obviously, no longer works as originally intended.

QUESTION
Is it possible to do what I am trying to do? It was possible in earlier versions of LibreOffice so the fact that it no longer works would seem to be due to a decision taken by LibreOffice developers – which they, no doubt, had good reason for taking – perhaps in favour of other functionality or to guard against some theoretical danger of importing named ranges into documents which already have named ranges.

In no way is it my intention to criticise LibreOffice. I believe that LibreOffice and free software generally is of almost incalculable value and I know that your work is of almost incalculable complexity. I would be interested to read what you have to say on this problem and if it is not possible to do what I am trying to do, I would be interested in any suggestions you have as to how it might be done.

Thanks in advance.
Andrew

[tohuwawohu]

First idea: would it be possible to start with the order documents initially containing all sheets that may be required in the further process? Removing sheets or simply excluding them from printing is quite easy - easier than handle importet sheets, i suppose.

[qubit1]

Hi @andrew3691,

Are you still looking for an Answer to your Question?

At first glance, it seems like the issue with Named Ranges is that there is ambiguity (after import) over which Named Ranges are being specified. If each imported sheet references a separate template file, there shouldn’t be any problem providing unambiguous references to the correct range in the correct template. It’s possible, however, that either LibreOffice or the ODF spec doesn’t currently support this kind of precision, and so therefore you are unable to differentiate one external sourcefile from another.

As a result, my suggestion is for you to please file an enhancement bug and ask for support for importing multiple sheets that reference different named ranges. If the feature already exists, then you’ll get a fix even faster!

Don’t forget to mark your bug as an ‘enhancement’. The QA team will be happy to help you triage your feature request in the bugtracker.

Please post a link to any bugs you file in a comment below using the format “fdo#123456”.

Thanks!