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Show HN: Nobie – an Excel-compatible runtime for agents and humans

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Re: Show HN: Nobie – an Excel-compatible runtime for agents and humans

#61

Post by njaremko »

gwid0n wrote: post #57
njaremko wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- We'll be putting out more content showing off Nobie. Too many screenshots felt distracting for the launch page. - There's no GUI for it at the moment, but you can programmatically load data into Nobie. If you have access to a data store, and you use LLM tools, you can just tell it to load the data in, and it'll work. The target market is all spreadsheet users, so we've definitely put thought into this exact problem…

So LLM retrieves data, puts it in the table (statically, as I understand), I perform some computations in the table and create a pivot table in another sheet. Next month comes, and I want to refresh the report. However, there's no refresh button, so I need to spend time rewriting the query and tokens to retrieve data every month?

- Today, you'd likely have the LLM write a script against the CLI, that you'd run whenever you want to refresh (assuming the query is fixed, given your example)

- Nobie will continue getting more customizable and programmable. You can see a hint of what's to come with our IDE inspired triple pane support with draggable UI elements. We'll get to a point in the near future where an LLM (or a developer/company) will make you the plugin and UI you want directly in Nobie, and you click a button to sync from your data source (or bind a to a key chord)

Re: Show HN: Nobie – an Excel-compatible runtime for agents and humans

#63

Post by njaremko »

jkaptur wrote: post #60
matthewgapp wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

built from the ground up in rust, with the aim that it's much faster than Excel. It supports all Excel formulas.

When you say you support "all Excel formulas", which version of Excel do you mean? I assume you don't support CALL and REGISTER... https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/excel/using-the-call-and...

That's fair, we don't support the functions tied to custom DLL loading xD

To be more precise, we support the entire "modern" function library in excel, that can be implemented without dependencies on Microsoft products/services. So if it can run locally, and isn't platform dependent, we run it. We, for example, support https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/excel/functions/filterxm... , so in some ways, we support more of excel than excel on non-windows platforms :P

We also support what-if scenarios, arrays, spills, cycles, all the non-cloud / non-DLL excel functions, data tables, conditional formatting, charts (though we don't allow creating / editing at the moment, that's coming very soon, there's a lot of configuration surface in those things, and we want the experience to be really good), etc. If you haven't tried it, maybe take it for a spin, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised with how much functionality we have.

Our biggest deficiency right now (in my opinion) is pivot tables, we don't let you create / edit / recalc them (though you can still build formulas on them). Our engine supports them, but we're still doing a bunch of testing on it to make sure it's rock solid before we turn them on for people.

Re: Show HN: Nobie – an Excel-compatible runtime for agents and humans

#64

Post by njaremko »

dmitry-vsl wrote: post #59
njaremko wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep :) We fully support the formula language, and workbook semantics. The main deficiency we have right now is not letting people create / edit pivot tables. We support what-if scenario analysis, conditional formatting, cycles, lambdas, arrays, spills, lets, etc.

Did you implement formulas from scratch, or used a third-party lib?

Everything's from scratch, we've been working on this for a long time :)

Re: Show HN: Nobie – an Excel-compatible runtime for agents and humans

#65

Post by njaremko »

njaremko wrote: post #9
Sorvad wrote: post #8

Would love a good, modern Excel alternative. A few feature requests: - Ability to set european number style as standard - Ability to import/open csv

- We had a bet internally about how long it'd take for someone to complain about default number styles, we'll get this in by tomorrow - CSV import can be done today either by using claude / codex and telling them to load the CSV into nobie (we install an MCP on first boot of the app, and we have a really nice built-in terminal, you can click the claude / codex buttons in the top button bar to launch them), or using t…

This slipped a day because I want to make sure I'm handling all the edge cases with locales properly. Sorry about that.

Re: Show HN: Nobie – an Excel-compatible runtime for agents and humans

#66

Post by tomelliot »

matthewgapp wrote: post #21
hmokiguess wrote: post #10

Tangential, but what's the art style of those images throughout the page? I really like them.

glad you like em :) we're going for a gritty, off-world museum vibes. Generated with midjourney.

can you share your prompt? i love the combination of digital + offworld vibes with the brushstrokes, i'd love to iterate on it.

also, such a smart idea to build the excel runtime alternative. remember us when you get snapped up by a lab for a training environment.

Re: Show HN: Nobie – an Excel-compatible runtime for agents and humans

#70

Post by matthewgapp »

narcraft wrote: post #69

Are you able to create formatted tables and use structured references? I see Tables listed as a feature on your webpage, but can't find any further information. If it's in the app already, I'm having trouble finding it.

it's a bit hidden and not fully featured. But we do support table references.

You can run cmd + T (or search for create table in the cmd +k menu) on a range to display the create table dialog.

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