Creating and editing documents

A method of processing a financial spreadsheet containing one or more financial terms, comprising:

• opening an electronic spreadsheet;
• providing a financial knowledge base containing a set of financial terms with one or more predefined properties including part-of properties relating financial terms to each other;
• imposing constraints on user manipulation of the spreadsheet with respect to the financial terms in the set in accordance with the one or more identified predefined properties associated with the financial terms;
• and
• receiving a user action substituting a user-defined alias for a predefined financial term name defined in the financial knowledge base and recording an alias for the inserted financial term in response to user action.

A method of processing a financial spreadsheet containing one or more financial terms, comprising:

• opening an electronic spreadsheet;
• providing a financial knowledge base containing a set of financial terms with one or more predefined properties including part-of properties relating financial terms to each other;
• imposing constraints on user manipulation of the spreadsheet with respect to the financial terms in the set in accordance with the one or more identified predefined properties associated with the financial terms;
• and
• changing the spreadsheet in response to a user action, the changing comprising duplicating a user-selected financial term in response to the user action, wherein a user-defined duplicate financial term is inserted into the spreadsheet and the sum of the duplicated financial term and the user-defined duplicate financial term is substituted in spreadsheet equations where the duplicated financial term appeared before being duplicated.

A method of processing a financial spreadsheet containing one or more financial terms, comprising:

• opening an electronic spreadsheet;
• providing a financial knowledge base containing a set of financial terms with one or more predefined properties including part-of properties relating financial terms to each other;
• imposing constraints on user manipulation of the spreadsheet with respect to the financial terms in the set in accordance with the one or more identified predefined properties associated with the financial terms;
• and
• changing the spreadsheet in response to a user action, the changing comprising itemizing a user-selected financial term in response to a user action, wherein the user-selected financial term is converted into a total expression associated with a value derived from one or more user-defined financial terms.

A computer program product, tangibly stored on a computer-readable medium, for processing a financial spreadsheet containing one or more financial terms, the product comprising instructions operable to cause a programmable processor to:

• open an electronic spreadsheet;
• open a financial knowledge base containing a set of financial terms with one or more predefined properties including part-of properties relating financial terms to each other;
• receive a user selection of a financial term contained in the financial knowledge base, the user-selected financial term having one or more predefined properties defined in the financial knowledge base;
• and
• receive a user request to insert the user-selected financial term into the spreadsheet and, in response, automatically insert into the spreadsheet the user-selected financial term and one or more financial terms defined by the financial knowledge base as being related to the user-selected financial term.

A computer program product, tangibly stored on a computer-readable medium, for processing a financial spreadsheet containing one or more financial terms, the product comprising instructions operable to cause a programmable processor to:

• open an electronic spreadsheet;
• open a financial knowledge base containing a set of financial terms with one or more predefined properties including part-of properties relating financial terms to each other;
• impose constraints on user manipulation of the spreadsheet with respect to the financial terms in the set in accordance with the one or more identified predefined properties associated with the financial terms;
• and
• receive a user action substituting a user-defined alias for a predefined financial term name defined in the financial knowledge base and record an alias for the inserted financial term in response to user action.

A computer program product, tangibly stored on a computer-readable medium, for processing a financial spreadsheet containing one or more financial terms, the product comprising instructions operable to cause a programmable processor to:

• open an electronic spreadsheet;
• open a financial knowledge base containing a set of financial terms with one or more predefined properties including part-of properties relating financial terms to each other;
• impose constraints on user manipulation of the spreadsheet with respect to the financial terms in the set in accordance with the one or more identified predefined properties associated with the financial terms;
• and
• change the spreadsheet in response to a user action, the change comprising duplicating a user-selected financial term in response to the user action, wherein a user-defined duplicate financial term is inserted into the spreadsheet and the sum of the duplicated financial term and the user-defined duplicate financial term is substituted in spreadsheet equations where the duplicated financial term appeared before being duplicated.

A computer program product, tangibly stored on a computer-readable medium, for processing a financial spreadsheet containing one or more financial terms, the product comprising instructions operable to cause a programmable processor to:

• open an electronic spreadsheet;
• open a financial knowledge base containing a set of financial terms with one or more predefined properties including part-of properties relating financial terms to each other;
• impose constraints on user manipulation of the spreadsheet with respect to the financial terms in the set in accordance with the one or more identified predefined properties associated with the financial terms;
• and
• change the spreadsheet in response to a user action, the change comprising itemizing a user-selected financial term in response to a user action, wherein the user-selected financial term is converted into a total expression associated with a value derived from one or more user-defined financial terms.