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Why do people still use VBA?

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Re: Why do people still use VBA?

#101

Post by mathgladiator »

toolslive wrote: post #82
throwaway154 wrote: post #2

Corps have a dev environment sitting right in Excel that doesn't need special (management, management's management, adding to a registrar of projects, budgeting or project manager assigned, etc) approval for non-stock software. The stack's Excel, plus Sharepoint if you're really looking for a networked data store that also has a web interface. From that end-user direction, solutions emerge. And they're in VBA.

I've seen the following at least twice: some department manager (marketeers typically have a nack for this) needs something, can't or won't bother the development team and starts off with "how difficult can it be" and before you know it they've written a few hundred lines of VBA, which serves their needs. But then, the next phase starts: that scripts gets copied over (because Jim wanted to run it too) and modified (J…

And thats great because demand has be satisfied!

Re: Why do people still use VBA?

#102

Post by darkwater »

coumbaya wrote: post #68
wiseowise wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always read those “X automated their job, finishes it 15 minutes and then does whatever” and wonder how true are they? How could it be that nobody notices or cares?

I started my career like this, with a boring job where I inherited a gigantic excel with a few macros. Every day I had to download via ftp millions of logs from high speed trains from all over france (the logs themselves were retrieved manually via a serial cable on each train by maintenance guys every few days). I would then run a few macros that would do a bunch of geoloc calculation, spit out results in 2 tables,…

Seeing the environment (SNCF contractor, I guess), kudos to your manager, they really went the extra mile with you and it's not what usually happens at all!

Re: Why do people still use VBA?

#103

Post by system2 »

I work with accountants. An average accountant is 50+. If they learned something like VBA or used some old friend who created automation, they stick to it. You can't explain what JS is to them. VBA just works.

Re: Why do people still use VBA?

#104

Post by account-5 »

No choice. I've learn VBA and Powershell only because they are the only things I have access to at work that allows the computer to work for me rather than the other way round. In the past I've run autohotkey portably to automate corporate systems that seem designed to maximize the number of clicks to get anything done, and for "glueing" systems that don't speak together. I'll learn anything that makes my life easier.

Re: Why do people still use VBA?

#105

Post by Havoc »

Because MS took a decade to get python into excel…and then promptly implemented it in a cloud fashion that sends confidential data out to their servers so I can’t fkin use it for work

Re: Why do people still use VBA?

#107

Post by hkgjjgjfjfjfjf »

0xpgm wrote: post #93
coumbaya wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I started my career like this, with a boring job where I inherited a gigantic excel with a few macros. Every day I had to download via ftp millions of logs from high speed trains from all over france (the logs themselves were retrieved manually via a serial cable on each train by maintenance guys every few days). I would then run a few macros that would do a bunch of geoloc calculation, spit out results in 2 tables,…

Nice story! Curious, was the manager a technical person e.g. a former engineer?

[dead]

Re: Why do people still use VBA?

#108

Post by amonavis »

wiseowise wrote: post #58
donatj wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. My friend automated his whole job in Excel. He supposedly can do a days work in fifteen minutes and then just hang out. Their computers are super locked down, can’t install anything, can’t go to any non-whitelisted sites, but they have Excel.

I always read those “X automated their job, finishes it 15 minutes and then does whatever” and wonder how true are they? How could it be that nobody notices or cares?

I spent the first couple of years at my first job like this. Without going through much detail, back in 2006 I had to pull raw network performance data from some 7 elements every hour, then use a tool to convert to CSVs, then load into Excel, perform preliminary analysis, then email the Excel files to another team along with any alarming conclusions if any.

A few weeks into the job I completely automated these in python and all I had to do was turn my laptop on in the morning, then off in the evening, and I was done.

Re: Why do people still use VBA?

#109

Post by menotyou »

Let's face it: IT is the bureaucracy department of modern times which can keep itself 95% busy with self inflicted problems and has 5% service orientation. Processes are opaque for outsiders and typically not helpful.

I really had to lough when I read the following description of the IBM BPM but this sums up a good part of the issue:

  "...while IBM BPM does come with a REST API, this REST API is borderline useless to Technology teams and SMEs

  Some REST calls use javascript encoded as strings Others require html embedded in json embedded in xml
  
  Database tables aren’t queried by name but by GUID.

  There’s no documentation of which GUID relates to which table/process.*"
Quite a lot of things became so outragedly complex no one outside of the IT bothers to handle these, and sometimes not even inside IT. It started with AJAX where suddenly half of the development effort went into designing frontend code and backend services, which honestly does not even touch the end users automation problem. And it went further downhill afterwards. UIs nowadays look modern but are generally as user hostile as the technology stack used to produce these.

In Excel my UI is just "there", I have a nice code generator aka as macro recorder, no IT department questioning my authorization to do something nor does not have time or budget to help me with my business problem.

So VBA is the workaround for users around the IT department. Not perfect, but better than what you would get else.

Re: Why do people still use VBA?

#110

Post by guappa »

asdfman123 wrote: post #56
michaelteter wrote: post #41

VB(A) is like Python. It's not pretty, but it gets the job done. (* if you think it's pretty, it's because you are inexperienced and don't know the many better alternatives *) Any tool with a good ecosystem (tools/libraries/integrations) which allows you to get real work done is useful. Visual Basic as a desktop app development system (or MS Access which added DB benefits) was very useful in a large number of scenari…

Future civilizations will marvel at the intricate grandeur of our Excel spreadsheets

They won't be able to read our media, and if so they won't be able to decode the excel format.
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