DH has been using a calculator to add things recorded in Excel

[RokaandRoll]

AIBU to think this is absolutely astonishing?

I found out because we were doing a new budget spreadsheet and he read out what we spend on different things each month while I recorded each item in Excel. He then asked me to read the amounts back to him so he could add them up. I was like WHAT??? I'll just add a formula in Excel. He said "really, you can do that?" I asked him what he thought Excel was for, and he said he didn't know as no one had taught him.

Have you ever found out someone was doing something in a completely bizarre and illogical way on a similar level as this? DH is in his 50s and is a quite intelligent person (or so I thought). He has used Excel in his job although obviously not extensively. AIBU to be completely shocked?

I haven’t got a clue how to do a formula in excel. YABU. Just let him do his thing.

For a lot of people, Excel is just electronic squared paper and that is all they need it for or use it for.

Excel is actually a bit rubbish with numbers IMVHO. It is better as a database but definitely wobbles when you ask too much of it.
In 30 years, I've used about 60 formulas (formulae for the pedants) which is a little over 10% of what's available, so it isn't unusual for anyone to see something for the first time.
The cleverest things I've learned are from watching folks get stuff wrong - knowing when to leave 'False' or '0' off a vlookup can turn an average user into a guru.

The day I asked a relative if she'd watched a particularly interesting space documentary, she said "God no! why do you watch those boring space programmes? I mean, everyone knows the universe is just the sun, 9 planets and a moon. I mean, how many documentaries can they make about that?!"

I was like, whaaaaat? 🫨

Cue a long conversation about the vast vast expanse of the universe and the colossal amount of other sun's, planets, moons, comets, asteroids, solar systems, galaxies, black holes etc etc.

For all the years before this, she'd simply thought all that was made up for cinematic effect for the likes of Star Trek films and never imagined it was actually real.

Clearly never paid any attention in science lessons at school!

And what about you, did you pay attention in English?

Ok I went onto Youtube and apparently I tie my laces by the "strange" rabbit ears method.

So what's the other method?

You can certainly sort tables in Word. The function is labeled AZ with a downward arrow, and is found in the ribbon to the left of the pilcrow (backward P) paragraph symbol.

Given that it's a perfectly well formed and understandable piece of writing, with one small typo that I've only seen because your bitchy put down suggested there was something to be found, then I'd have to conclude that yes, she did pay attention in "English".

(I assume of course that you meant "English lessons", despite your own incomplete sentence.)

We use Excel, Word, PowerPoint etc regularly at work. No one ever taught us. I worked out most of it by trial and error, checking occasionally with IT guy, asking my DH and getting tips from co workers at random times. TBH I've probably given others more tips than they've ever given me, though I do now have a well informed colleague but even he is clueless re some of the features of Excel. We had a new central information system recently and we're told we don't need training as it's all intuitive - some of it is, most certainly isn't.

Sat the O Level in 1985. I have a feeling we were the first year to be offered it as an O Level subject. I remember the “computer lab” being opened with much fanfare (and enough BBC computers for a class to have a machine each) in around 1982 or 83.

So what I wrote constitutes a "bitchy put down" in your opinion, but lambasting a relative's lack of knowledge is perfectly nice and kind?

It literally does though:

1640s, "one who calculates, a reckoner, one whose occupation is to make arithmetical calculations," agent noun from compute (v.).

Meaning "calculating machine" (of any type) is from 1897; in modern use, "programmable digital electronic device for performing mathematical or logical operations," 1945 under this name (the thing itself was described by 1937 in a theoretical sense as Turing machine). ENIAC (1946) usually is considered the first.

Computer literacy is recorded from 1970; an attempt to establish computerate (adjective, on model of literate) in this sense in the early 1980s didn't catch on. Computerese "the jargon of programmers" is from 1960, as are computerize and computerization.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A New York Congressman says the use of computers to record personal data on individuals, such as their credit background, "is just frightening to me." [news article, March 17, 1968]

Earlier words for "one who calculates" include computator (c. 1600), from Latin computator; computist (late 14c.) "one skilled in calendrical or chronological reckoning."also from 1640s

It was one of the 2 parts of the ICT GCSE which was mandatory. The first part was building a complete database using Excel, that made up 60% of the coursework.

I'm not arguing. I'm stating fact.
And there is more than one reason your original statement is wrong.
Usually I would happily explain to someone who didn't know something, or who thought they knew something, but got it wrong. With no judgement.
However, you came on a thread to castigate someone else's lack of knowledge, and, well, got it wrong. So I think it would be more useful for you to find out for yourself.

And yet, having been corrected twice, you still didn’t bother to look it up before you started pontificating again.

And then, having realised that maybe “machine” was wrong and edited your post, you still didn’t bother to look it up before doubling down on “adding”!

The mind boggles.

If you think a single rogue apostrophe is to the understanding of English, as not knowing of the existence of anything whatsoever outside our immediate solar system is to the understanding of science, then I don't know what to say.

The rabbit ear method was used by occupational therapists for kids with learning difficulties as it far easier to learn.

I learned it that way due to my disability which effects my motor functions but everyone else I know learned the classic 'fox chasing the bunny' way.

But... it does... I haven't been corrected?

The "er" suffix is the machine part.

I'm unsure what you think it means?

Grr edit for typo! Er not or obvs

If he's the right age, King Rollo probably taught him. It's a far superior knot IMO.

The magic happens about 2 minutes in.

Awww I LOVED Rollo! Haven’t thought about that for years.

And I still remember the first time I saw someone concatenate columns in a spreadsheet - I could have cried for joy as I was just about to embark on an upsetting merging process that I knew was going to end in tears.

That's a real blast from the past. I remember using Lotus 123 when I first started work in the late 1980s.

Can you pick out the bit in what you quoted here that you think supports the claim “the word computer literally means adding machine”?

Ah I see the confusion. I think you don't accept that "reckoning" is a synonym for "adding". But it is the original meaning of the word reckoning

Anyone else use AmiPro? I have no idea how widespread it was!