DELTA in Collabora Office: Create Exact Numeric Match Indicators for Audit Checks

• Introduced: the original Collabora release and launch date are not established by the reviewed sources.
• Availability: documented in Collabora Office 26.04 desktop help.
• Platform scope: online and mobile deployment support is not inferred from the desktop documentation.
• Checked: October 14, 2026. Function-specific documentation and independent controls; no native Collabora execution.

=DELTA(Number1 [; Number2])

The Collabora help describes equality between two numbers and marks Number2 optional. It does not state the omitted Number2 default in this section, so every worked DELTA call below supplies both arguments.

The reference labels the outcomes TRUE (1) and FALSE (0). This tutorial uses the documented 1/0 indicator values for arithmetic; it does not add an unverified native TYPE classification. Text/Boolean coercion, blank inputs and exact native error codes also remain unverified.

DELTA is an exact equality check. It does not subtract the arguments, measure the size of a discrepancy or automatically apply a numerical tolerance.

Enter this table in A1:B6:

In C2 enter and fill through C6:

=DELTA(A2;B2)

Independently expected indicators are 1, 0, 1, 1 and 0. Equal zeros and equal negative numbers are still equal numeric values; equality does not require positive quantities.

In D2 put =B2-A2 and fill down. Differences are 0, −1, 0, 0 and 3. DELTA reports whether values match, while subtraction shows direction and size. Keeping both makes the reconciliation more informative.

With C2:C6 containing the indicator sequence, =SUM(C2:C6) has expected result 3. There are five numeric pairs in this fixture, so =5-SUM(C2:C6) gives 2 mismatches.

This count depends on the declared five-pair setup. Do not reuse the literal 5 for an expanded dataset without updating the denominator. SUM adds the documented indicators; it does not independently validate the input pairs.

Changing the second received value from 7 to 8 changes its DELTA result from 0 to 1. The matching count becomes 4, and the mismatch count becomes 1. That is a reproducible check that the totals follow the underlying comparison.

Return to the original table. Enter importance weights 2, 5, 1, 4 and 3 in E2:E6. In F2 use:

=(1-C2)*E2

Fill down. Expected weighted discrepancy values are 0, 5, 0, 0 and 3, totaling 8. Matching rows contribute zero; mismatches contribute their declared importance weights.

This is an illustrative scoring rule, not a measure of the numerical difference. The row missing one unit has weight 5, while the row over by three units has weight 3. If the intended score is quantity-based, use the actual differences instead of confusing the two models.

The total of all five weights is 15, so matched rows account for weight 7. That complementary check confirms 7+8=15.

For an exact binary-representable example, =DELTA(1/2;0.5) has expected indicator 1. A direct comparison of 10 and 10.125 differs, so =DELTA(10;10.125) gives 0.

Suppose the application deliberately accepts an absolute difference of at most 0.25. This is a separate policy:

=IF(ABS(10-10.125)<=0.25;1;0)

Expected indicator: 1. With the second value changed to 10.5, the same policy returns 0. ABS measures discrepancy magnitude and IF expresses the declared decision.

The tolerance formula does not change DELTA’s exact-equality meaning. Choose the tolerance based on the data’s requirements rather than adding one merely to hide a mismatch.

Do not certify an expression such as DELTA(0.1+0.2;0.3) from decimal arithmetic alone. Native binary floating-point evaluation and comparison details were not tested here. The primary examples use exact integers, and the tolerance example uses exact binary fractions.

The official source control =DELTA(1;2) returns 0. Missing-argument behavior, mixed types, blanks and error propagation remain unverified. Keep numeric input validation separate from equality: a successful comparison alone is not proof that imported fields had the intended types.

• Collabora Office 26.04: DELTA.
• Editorial testing standards.

Complete function-specific documentation reviewed. Outputs are independently calculated positional, equality or arithmetic models, not captured native application results. Formulas use English names and semicolon separators; optional-argument brackets describe syntax and are not typed into a working formula.