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From: Bob Goethe
Date: 2016 Oct 28, 12:59 -0700
I see that Excel 2013 has an LN() function available to it...but the flavor of Visual Basic which I have integrated with my graphics program, CorelDraw, does not support this function per se.
I do see that there is a derived function that Corel supports that looks like this:
Logarithm to base N:
LogN(X) = Log(X) / Log(N)
I don't (yet) know enough about natural logarithms to know how, if at all, this "LogN()" relates to Excel's "LN()".
Presumably if need be, I could use Excel to generate a list of coordinates where I would want to lay down hash marks for a scale. But getting Corel to do it directly would be more straightforward...if Corel can do it on its own at all, that is.
I do see that http://www.antiquark.com/sliderule/sim/n3t/virtual-n3-t.html illustrates an Ln scale, and even lets one play around with it. That will give me an idea of the layout for the scale I should come up with if I can figure out what to feed to an equation to generate it.
I think before I get into adding a scale to my slide rule, I am going to have to go back to school on logarithms, so to speak. The last time I worked with them was 45 years ago.
Gary, could you work through one rhumb line problem from beginning to end using your equations, so that I have a model to follow as I try and sort out how to do this myself? It will help me spot elementary errors if I know what the right answer should be to a particular calculation.
Thanks so much,
Bob