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Subject: RATE function (and FV,NPER,PMT,PV) PayType parameter
Hi, In our RATE() function we have a PayType parameter that is said to designate whether payment is due at end of period or start of period, but we do not explicitly restrict the value to be either 0 or 1. Also ECMA/MOOXML documents the parameter to be the "timing of the payment, truncated to integer" and be either 0 or 1, and I guess that is what applications implemented. However, Excel does not constrain the parameter to {0;1} but instead yields different results for different fractional values of PayType, also values >1.0 and <0.0 are possible. I tend to explicitly allow this and change the "boolean" {0;1} behavior to an offset (in periods) to the end date of a payment period towards the start date. However, this must correspond with functions FV(), NPER(), PMT() and PV(). Opinions on this? Mathematical constraints? Insights on what Excel really does? Eike -- Automatic string conversions considered dangerous. They are the GOTO statements of spreadsheets. --Robert Weir on the OpenDocument formula subcommittee's list.
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