In Wheland Associates v. Jaslow Dental Laboratories Inc., 797 F.2d 1223 (3rd Cir 1986), the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit expressed the ideas versus expression dichotomy somewhat differently, stating:
The purpose or function of a utilitarian work would be in the work's idea and everything that is not necessary to that purpose or function would be part of the expression of the idea... Where there are various means of achieving the desired purpose, then the particular means chosen is not necessary to the purpose; hence there is expression, not idea.
Id. at 1236. Similarly, in Lotus Development Corp v. Paperback Software International, 740 F. Supp 37 (D. Mass 1990), the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts proclaimed: ``The decision maker must focus on whether those elements allegedly copied| are a substantial part of the allegedly copyrightable work.'' Id. at 61.
Thus, under the Wheland test, the court would conclude that it was necessary for a spread sheet program to use columns, and, accordingly, this is an unprotectable aspect of the program. Always printing, for example, a computer's computation time at the bottom left of any print out would not be necessary to the function or purpose of a spread sheet program and, thus, may embody protectable expression under the Wheland test. Questions remain unresolved, however, since most program statements can be considered, at some level, ``necessary'' to the program; otherwise the statements would not be in the program.