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Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

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Re: Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

#91

Post by kylebrown »

ObeyTheGrid wrote: post #36
pg wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No more than any version one of something is precluded from becoming complete. Maybe you think you're making some sort of important point here. Or maybe you realize your comment is inane and you think it's witty. But (perhaps without realizing it) you and the people upvoting you represent one of the worst forces at work in the world. The people who ridicule new things when they first appear in incomplete form are one…

>And you know what's the biggest thing holding them back? The fear that people will make fun of the first thing they launch. Good. The software world is absolutely flooded with half baked crap backed by expensive marketing. As a software user it's a waste of my time when somebody releases "A Simply Remarkable Spreadsheet" that allows you to "organize and work with them in a whole new intuitive way" and it lacks the b…

> The people doing this are savvy and know what they are doing, which is basically conning users with false promises.

Its not the users being conned, but VC "investors".

Re: Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

#92

Post by iaskwhy »

ekianjo wrote: post #73
pg wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No more than any version one of something is precluded from becoming complete. Maybe you think you're making some sort of important point here. Or maybe you realize your comment is inane and you think it's witty. But (perhaps without realizing it) you and the people upvoting you represent one of the worst forces at work in the world. The people who ridicule new things when they first appear in incomplete form are one…

I think the question was very valid. It's like if you describe "an word processing app, but for now it only integrates pictures in the document. Typing function to come later!" - in the same way a spreadsheet is not software that is used to put pictures and tables. Expectations when you see the word "spreadsheet" is being able to run complex, calculations, and maybe macros to accelerate your workflow. Calling this pi…

Wouldn't that be only for power users? I am very good at Excel myself but it's not part of my job to work with it so I'd say most of the time I use Excel as a quick storage for data and not as a calculation sheet. Grid sounds great for almost every case where you would fire up Excel but not actually do any complex calculations. It made me think of this article by Joel Spolsky about Trello (and spreadsheets): http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2012/01/06.html

Re: Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

#93

Post by bconway »

pg wrote: post #24
atacrawl wrote: post #19

One feature that’s still missing, though, is actually running spreadsheet-style calculations on your numbers in Grid. Doesn't this preclude Grid from being a spreadsheet app?

No more than any version one of something is precluded from becoming complete. Maybe you think you're making some sort of important point here. Or maybe you realize your comment is inane and you think it's witty. But (perhaps without realizing it) you and the people upvoting you represent one of the worst forces at work in the world. The people who ridicule new things when they first appear in incomplete form are one…

Maybe you think you're making some sort of important point here. Or maybe you realize your comment is inane and you think it's witty. But (perhaps without realizing it) you and the people upvoting you represent one of the worst forces at work in the world. The people who ridicule new things when they first appear in incomplete form are one of the worst drags on innovation.

Really surprised to see something like this from Paul. Totally not in the spirit of HN.

Re: Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

#94

Post by v0cab »

iaskwhy wrote: post #92
ekianjo wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the question was very valid. It's like if you describe "an word processing app, but for now it only integrates pictures in the document. Typing function to come later!" - in the same way a spreadsheet is not software that is used to put pictures and tables. Expectations when you see the word "spreadsheet" is being able to run complex, calculations, and maybe macros to accelerate your workflow. Calling this pi…

Wouldn't that be only for power users? I am very good at Excel myself but it's not part of my job to work with it so I'd say most of the time I use Excel as a quick storage for data and not as a calculation sheet. Grid sounds great for almost every case where you would fire up Excel but not actually do any complex calculations. It made me think of this article by Joel Spolsky about Trello (and spreadsheets): http://w…

Almost everyone who uses a spreadsheet wants to do basic arithmetic in it, though.

Look at the demo video on the site. There's a list of expenses and dollar costs. But you can't automatically sum them? Anyone familiar with spreadsheets would consider that a pretty fundamental feature.

Re: Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

#95

Post by iaskwhy »

v0cab wrote: post #94
iaskwhy wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't that be only for power users? I am very good at Excel myself but it's not part of my job to work with it so I'd say most of the time I use Excel as a quick storage for data and not as a calculation sheet. Grid sounds great for almost every case where you would fire up Excel but not actually do any complex calculations. It made me think of this article by Joel Spolsky about Trello (and spreadsheets): http://w…

Almost everyone who uses a spreadsheet wants to do basic arithmetic in it, though. Look at the demo video on the site. There's a list of expenses and dollar costs. But you can't automatically sum them? Anyone familiar with spreadsheets would consider that a pretty fundamental feature.

Sure but we are talking about something not that hard to add to the app. I was talking more about those asking for pivot tables, etc.

Re: Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

#96

Post by brlewis »

pg wrote: post #85
atacrawl wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I asked a straightforward question about whether an app that can't be used to create a spreadsheet should be considered a spreadsheet app, and because of that I "represent one of the worst forces at work in the world." I neither ridiculed nor made fun of Grid, as you claim I did; however, you seem to take pleasure in ridiculing and making fun of me. I'm sorry that I didn't heap the app with praise -- from the video I…

The reason I interpreted your question as a snarky one is that it seemed such a pointless one otherwise-- like asking, say, whether a boat can be called a boat at a stage so early in its construction that it wouldn't float. But it sounds from your reply like you really did mean it seriously. Perhaps you believed that the guys who wrote Grid never intended to develop it further, and you were puzzled that they were cal…

I think the you misinterpreted his question by rushing past the TechCrunch headline.

If you see a headline that says "Dewey Defeats Truman" you expect to read a story explaining that Truman has been defeated. Similarly, if you see a headline that says "Grid Reinvents The Spreadsheet" you expect to read a story that explains that the spreadsheet has been reinvented.

In the story itself, the founders don't pretend that Grid has a reinvented spreadsheet ready to go. They have an interesting proof of concept that they intend to enhance until it reinvents the spreadsheet.

A reader, having been misled by the headline (not misled by the founders) is naturally going to ask atacrawl's question. Any criticism implied in such a question is properly directed at TechCrunch, not at Grid.

In atacrawl's position, I would be distressed at the people "agreeing" with the snark you misread from his question.

Re: Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

#97

Post by stcredzero »

Johngibb wrote: post #83
stcredzero wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no name calling there. He's covering the bases of the commenter's mental state, then explaining the unfortunate circumstance he sees. The "maybe you" phrases could be interpreted as harshness, but I think it's more likely that they're to be taken exactly at face value, and that pg wants to call attention to this circumstance.

I honestly don't believe it's fair to not interpret the maybes as name calling. Even so, the "But you ... represent one of the worst forces at work in the world" cannot possibly be defended as not a personal attack. Come on! I would not say that to someone's face, and it certainly isn't being civil.

Then you admit that the content is okay, but that the wording of the last bit is unfortunate. Looks like an understandable mistake of editing and point of view, not a deliberate attack.

Re: Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

#98

Post by samstave »

skardan wrote: post #86
samstave wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

PG, You are wrong in this post. The colloquial definition of a spreadsheet app in about 100% of the world at this time is the ability to do calcs. This video is fantastic, but what shows is currently purely a layout app (hence the grid nomenclature) - frankly - it is a visual Workflowy. Also, you know what is a drag on innovation, lack of cordial discussion (I am a perpetrator of this myself - even on HN, I get emoti…

> The colloquial definition of a spreadsheet app in about 100% of the world at this time is the ability to do calcs. For me Grid got right the essence how and why some people use spreadsheet for non-calc tasks. If people write long text, they start text editor. If they want to add more "structure", they do not implement new DB application, but they start spreadsheet app. Especially in corporate world: if manager want…

I agree with this very much - I was just pointing out though that the term "spreadsheet" to anyone I know is automatically assumed to include the ability to calculate.

I use Excel for most everything (e.g. I do all my patch matrix docs for the DC, MDF, IDF buildouts in excel. Modelling the physical layout of a switch in Excel to show what ports are patched where - and while I am not doing any formulas in these particular docs - sometimes I do (clacing bandwidth, subscription etc...)

Re: Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

#99

Post by prodigal_erik »

ArbitraryLimits wrote: post #56
killwhitey wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe I'm just not familiar with modern usage of the word 'spreadsheet' but when I hear it I instantly think of accounting worksheets, visicalc, excel and the like. If the very core of this app isn't the same as a classic spreadsheet app, why even throw that word around? It's bad marketing.

I think it's excellent marketing - they're clearly targeting people who use the word "spreadsheet" to mean "lists that don't involve math" and it's always easier to keep speaking your target customer's language than to try to teach them a new one.

Words mean things. There's an external cost to society when marketers engage in deceptions that only work for the ignorant. It adds friction to the marketplace; each instance makes it a little bit harder for customers to find the goods and services they're after, and for legitimate vendors to be found.

It's also a missed opportunity to offer those people UIs that fit their tasks, rather than encourage them to continue poor use of the only tool they know.

Re: Grid (YC S12) Reinvents The Spreadsheet For The Tablet Age

#100

Post by erikpukinskis »

mej10 wrote: post #21
atacrawl wrote: post #19

One feature that’s still missing, though, is actually running spreadsheet-style calculations on your numbers in Grid. Doesn't this preclude Grid from being a spreadsheet app?

It isn't even that hard to get a basic implementation of such functionality. Not sure why this is missing. Just make a directed graph out of cell references. Get the strongly connected components. All of the components with more than one vertex contain a loop and can't be computed. Remove those and you get a directed acyclic graph. Now you can topological sort them for cell dependencies, and start calculating them in…

Apple could've thrown copy and paste into the first iPhone, but they didn't because they didn't feel they had it right.

They might be in the process of actually designing an interface for formulas that actually expands the reach of such functionality. You know, something that the "I'm bad at math" crowd could actually dig into, make use of, and learn within.

If you release a basic not-that-hard-to-implement version of the functionality, it's WAY harder to drop in a new, innovative model afterwards. I think there's a lot of sense in waiting until they can get it right, if they're planning on doing something different with it--which, judging by the other UI departures they've made, I wouldn't be surprised if they are.

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