Lotus Development Corp is now shipping its Improv for Windows spreadsheet at $100 until May 31, after which it rises to $500: Improv was originally developed – from scratch – for the NeXT Computer System and enables use of plain English instead of formulae, using lables like sales and expenses; switching between views of the data – from regional sales by month to monthly sales by region is a single click inversion; Lotus insists it is impossible to retrofit Improv-like features on existing spreadsheets because the architecture is fundamentally different – which means that while it can import 1-2-3 and Excel worksheets, it can’t use 1-2-3 or Excel macros; according to the Wall Street Journal, observers worry that Lotus will go off half-cock in marketing Improv for fear of hurting sales of its core 1.2-3.
