Axel Renihold's
MacroCALC (mc) interactive spreadhsheet calculator
is an interactive, macro-programmable tool. mc has no graphic features, but therefore it can run also on terminals. It uses a convenient, well-known user interface and has some special features especially interesting in the UNIX environment.
mc has an elaborate operating
system via piping.
That is, mc and Unix tools like Awk can be easily intergrated.
A "cell" statement has the syntax:
cell < command
(and "command" is any Unix script, e.g. using Awk). When such a
cell is entered, it will:
execute the command
put the command's output into the range
of cells starting with cell as the upper-left corner.
The output
is read line by line into the rows of the range. The columns, which
have to be separated by "tab" in the output of the command, are
placed into the columns of the range.
At the end of the data a
special cell value designated 'EOF' (end of file) is placed in the
cell below the data.
This offers great flexibility based upon the Unix operating
system's piping mechanism
