Re: The enduring appeal of Microsoft Excel

On 2024-10-29, rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:

On Tue, 29 Oct 2024 07:24:23 -0000 (UTC), RonB wrote:
>

There was almost no difference between using Excel vs Calc even back
then. But why anyone would use a spreadsheet for a job better suited to
a database is still a mystery to me.

>
My experience with Excel users is 'if you have a hammer everything looks
like a nail'. I'm not sure if I've ever seen a spreadsheet used as
intended.

I don't think I have either (except in the tutorials). Spreadsheets instead
of databases were usually used in the phone business for cable records. When
I was contracting (with my brother) they had no cable records at the
American Airlines maintenance facility in Tulsa, Oklahoma. So we got to
start from scratch — we were making a lot of changes anyhow. I used dBASE
for that site. When the contract was over, I think they requested that I
send them the records to them in an Excel spreadsheet (which was easy to
do). It's not hard to convert a spreadsheet into a database (and vice versa)
if the spreadsheet is well formatted. Unfortunately most spreadsheet users,
that I've seen, seem to think that data spread inconsistently all over the
place.

I'm guessing if I ever saw an accountant's spreadsheet, I would be a little
more impressed. But they're using it for what spreadsheets are made to do.

--
“Evil is not able to create anything new, it can only distort and destroy
what has been invented or made by the forces of good.”  —J.R.R. Tolkien