Deploying Excel in production is like deploying a beadboard in a piece of consumer electronics. You just give away too much control to keep your deployment robust. Having said that, Excel is an excellent tool - just not for everything under the sun!
Stop Using Excel, Finance Chiefs Tell Staffs
351–360 of 435 posts
Re: Stop Using Excel, Finance Chiefs Tell Staffs
#352Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, it’s called the datasheet view.
Access does have a datasheet view, but it is _much_ less powerful than Excel e.g. copy/paste multiple cells, fill down, and it is SLOWER.
In a database you don't "fill down". You build a query to generate what you want (enter the expressions once) and click on the "data sheet" view for the query. It's different, but the simplicity of referencing $A$5 in excel and using whatever cells you want as inputs is way simpler than any way you might take user inputs in Access.
Re: Stop Using Excel, Finance Chiefs Tell Staffs
#353I would argue that the most commonly used programming language is Excel. But few of the people using it realize they're programming. It's a brilliant reactive data programming model that makes intuitive sense to non-technical users. They feel empowered to use it to solve problems right now with a computer. They experiment with it, try things, Google how to do more things- just like any programmer does. And they feel…
M$ft XL developer here. I attended a conference to meet our Excel guru users and it's fairly impressive what these non-coders achieve.
Excel is like an operating system to them, and they even create Excel files to "debug" there other Excel files, e.g. debugging the order of formula calculation and validating the output at each step in their property assets spreadsheets - without using any VBA
Re: Stop Using Excel, Finance Chiefs Tell Staffs
#354I would argue that the most commonly used programming language is Excel. But few of the people using it realize they're programming. It's a brilliant reactive data programming model that makes intuitive sense to non-technical users. They feel empowered to use it to solve problems right now with a computer. They experiment with it, try things, Google how to do more things- just like any programmer does. And they feel…
Completely agree. It's common to tell kids (and everyone) that they need to "learn to code." That is what Excel already is! And it's incredibly powerful, especially if you don't have any other coding skills. But, of course, it's messy. When tens of millions of people can each write their own programs and easily modify them and change them to suit their own needs without needing to recompile or anything, then you get…
Excel is a great way to code, but a horrible way to decode. Every try to pick apart someone else's spreadsheet.
Re: Stop Using Excel, Finance Chiefs Tell Staffs
#355I would argue that the most commonly used programming language is Excel. But few of the people using it realize they're programming. It's a brilliant reactive data programming model that makes intuitive sense to non-technical users. They feel empowered to use it to solve problems right now with a computer. They experiment with it, try things, Google how to do more things- just like any programmer does. And they feel…
Honestly the article stinks like an advertorial of cloud vendors trying to push their wares. I agree that Excel isn't a good fit for many things, but blanket rules like 'no excel' seem counterproductive.
Why do we readers take these sorts of things at face value? You know the whole article is a sales pitch.
Re: Stop Using Excel, Finance Chiefs Tell Staffs
#356Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe I did not appreciate it properly, but I remember using Lotus Notes at my work a few years ago, and I can remember it being the most awful piece of software I have ever used. Admittingly I am not a specialist, more an employee trying to use it to do my job.
> I can remember it being the most awful piece of software I have ever used Many people seem to say the same thing but the only problem I could ever see (in occasional use) was a non-standard UI which non-technical users had trouble grasping. What made it so awful?
Navigation, the UI, the way the databases where setup. I can remember that even basic things not working the way normal windows applications work (usability related things), but it was so long ago I can't remember the specific things, sorry. Just that it was awful.
Re: Stop Using Excel, Finance Chiefs Tell Staffs
#357Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe I did not appreciate it properly, but I remember using Lotus Notes at my work a few years ago, and I can remember it being the most awful piece of software I have ever used. Admittingly I am not a specialist, more an employee trying to use it to do my job.
> I can remember it being the most awful piece of software I have ever used Many people seem to say the same thing but the only problem I could ever see (in occasional use) was a non-standard UI which non-technical users had trouble grasping. What made it so awful?
Using Lotus Notes at my current employer.
Notes itself has some great functionality. The UI feels a little clunky - but generally you can do what you need to do.
The main problems I encounter is the way our IT department have deployed it. Many functions are not enabled or only partially working. As far as I am aware, we have no Lotus/Domino expert in our country; head office (other side of the world) has quite a few though. Any requests made through our regional helpdesk for fixes/improvements mostly go nowhere.
I like the idea of the replicated databases for email and other business functions. It should mean staff could switch to a different machine and quickly and painlessly get access to all their email and other data. However, there is a considerable amount of convoluted configuration required (the way it is currently configured) that appears to require local admin access that makes it impossible without helpdesk assistance.
I suspect many companies deployed Lotus/Domino is similar semi-functional ways that made it less useful than it could be.
The reason many companies migrated away from Lotus/Domino though was the risk of vendor lock in. My employer is stuck with a vast amount of business process captured in Lotus/Domino. They have been slowly migrating core functionality out to other web or networked database applications over the last 12 years. Even so, I don't see any move away from Lotus Notes for email for many years to come.
Re: Stop Using Excel, Finance Chiefs Tell Staffs
#358Earlier quoted context omitted.
Completely agree. It's common to tell kids (and everyone) that they need to "learn to code." That is what Excel already is! And it's incredibly powerful, especially if you don't have any other coding skills. But, of course, it's messy. When tens of millions of people can each write their own programs and easily modify them and change them to suit their own needs without needing to recompile or anything, then you get…
Excel is a great way to code, but a horrible way to decode. Every try to pick apart someone else's spreadsheet.
You could make the same argument about most programming languages. I hate to sound like I'm parroting Spolsky, but, he's right that the reason that the reason every developer ever wants to re-write the code they inherit is because it's easier to write code than it is to read it.
It's obviously an exaggeration, but not by much.
Re: Stop Using Excel, Finance Chiefs Tell Staffs
#359I would argue that the most commonly used programming language is Excel. But few of the people using it realize they're programming. It's a brilliant reactive data programming model that makes intuitive sense to non-technical users. They feel empowered to use it to solve problems right now with a computer. They experiment with it, try things, Google how to do more things- just like any programmer does. And they feel…
Honestly the article stinks like an advertorial of cloud vendors trying to push their wares. I agree that Excel isn't a good fit for many things, but blanket rules like 'no excel' seem counterproductive. Why do we readers take these sorts of things at face value? You know the whole article is a sales pitch.
I suppose you either understand how PR works and simply disregard anything printed or broadcast and do your own research, and accept this system unlikely to change...
Or you get irritated by it, while waiting for the "inevitable" collapse of this promotional/propaganda model...
Honestly I don't know what is happening, but it seemed like the first option, which I've followed for a couple of decades is a good enough cure for disillusionment and depression. (Caused by investing in the second option)
Edit: add quotes to inevitable.
Re: Stop Using Excel, Finance Chiefs Tell Staffs
#360“Excel just wasn’t designed to do some of the heavy lifting that companies need to do in finance,” said Paul Hammerman, a business applications analyst at Forrester Research Inc.
Instead, companies are turning to new, cloud-based technologies from Anaplan Inc., Workiva Inc., Adaptive Insights and their competitors.
The newer software connects with existing accounting and enterprise resource management systems, including those made by Oracle Corp. or SAP SE . This lets accountants aggregate, analyze and report data on one unified platform, often without additional training.
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reads like a "submarine