CalcLink -- Bringing the Power of Mathematica to OpenOffice Calc Spreadsheets

Andreas Lauschke

Andreas Lauschke Consulting

Abstract

CalcLink is an add-on package that provides bidirectional connectivity with Calc, the spreadsheet component of the platform-independent OpenOffice suite. With CalcLink it's possible to harness the full power of the Mathematica system from Calc and make results usable in the Calc spreadsheet, or to access the Calc spreadsheet features from Mathematica! CalcLink allows the user to combine the ease of use and convenience of the Calc spreadsheet environment with the computational and graphics power of the Mathematica system in both directions! With CalcLink Mathematica code can be used as if it were a macro, and Calc can be used to display Mathematica results in spreadsheets!

The entire breadth of all Mathematica functions becomes easily accessible from Calc, enhancing the Calc spreadsheet environment with symbolic computation, optimization methods, modern statistical functions, data-mining, lightning-fast giga-numerics, linear algebra functions, and state-of-the art visualization! 

Arrays of any type can be sent and received, calculations can be interrupted, and a graphical front-end for the Mathematica kernel with full Mathematica graphics and color-coding and bracket-matching for quick "scratchpad evaluations" are provided from within Calc. Spreadsheets can be imported and exported, data can be sent from Mathematica to any spreadsheet location, Mathematica graphics can be generated from Calc, the Mathematica front-end can be launched and used from Calc, and all Mathematica functions (including packages and front-end functions) can be browsed from Calc.