Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel

#91

Post by sixothree » Tue, Aug 22, 2023, 2:30 PM UTC

john-radio wrote: post #79

sixothree wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you just please fix the issue with date strings (such as "20230822090811") being converted into scientific notation? I've received literally hundreds of these documents over the past decade. And as long as this problem exists, I will keep receiving them. Can you please just add a button - "unmess this document"? The number of man-hours I've wasted re-creating documents is countless. My job is to do other things n…

The scientific notation ("2.02308E+13") is just how Excel displays a large enough numeric value like your example; it's not doing any conversion, as you can see if you paste that number into Excel, confirm that it's showing the scientific notation, and then click into the cell to confirm that the formula bar still shows the original number (20230822090811). If you paste your date string in a more standard date format…

Do you _really_ think I've spent the past 10 years getting files like this and I still don't understand the reason. I didn't ask for an explanation. I asked for a fix. What are you doing here??

I can provide instructions on how to do this until the cows come home. I will still get files with these issues. Is that not obvious?

Do you really think I want to examine _tens of thousands of rows_ in documents that are 100 cells wide looking for a single exponent value!?!?!?! Is that really what you're suggesting as a fix here?

Re: Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel

#92

Post by HelloMcFly » Tue, Aug 22, 2023, 2:32 PM UTC

tigeroil wrote: post #37

brokencode wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably because Excel runs in a web browser nowadays and they want to avoid creating a separate way of running Python locally for a locally installed copy of Excel. Maybe they will in the future, but it makes sense to start with the approach that will work in both web and local installs.

Looking at what they're doing with Outlook I'd bet money that they intend to replace the desktop version of Excel with the web version sooner or later.

I dread this day greatly, but it's definitely coming.

Re: Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel

#93

Post by gpjt » Tue, Aug 22, 2023, 2:32 PM UTC

petepete wrote: post #32

Finally the Resolver One dream is coming true, just 15 or 16 years late. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6EV2jiKRfc

Interestingly enough, when Resolver One didn't work out in the marketplace, we pivoted to PythonAnywhere. That took off nicely, and was acquired by Anaconda last year. And now Anaconda is realising those old dreams :-)

BTW for clarity: the team working on this inside Anaconda is entirely separate from the PythonAnywhere team. It would have made a perfect Hollywood-ready story if it had been the same people...

Re: Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel

#94

Post by duxup » Tue, Aug 22, 2023, 2:32 PM UTC

baz00 wrote: post #81

I have to see some red flags here. The very nature and power of Excel comes from the fact that workbooks can stand alone. This means that the process is eternally tied to the cloud now. So when you, 3 years down the line, have to open a workbook from your deceased colleague, you are at the whim of the vendor supporting the existence of this integration. Step one of any workload will always be "work out how to make th…

Yeah I’ve received so many broken Excel documents and it’s just constant frustration.

Half the things don’t work, customer is sure it worked in X ( now broken and invisible way ) and they really don’t remember that correctly.

Re: Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel

#95

Post by easton » Tue, Aug 22, 2023, 2:33 PM UTC

inglor wrote: post #49

cableshaft wrote: post #13

I wish it wasn't solely powered only by Microsoft Cloud and could support python running locally, but regardless I think this will still be huge and single-handedly modernizes Excel by a large margin. This alone could eliminate the need for websites that just want this sort of data. I can think of a past project at a previous job I did building an analytics website used only by a handful of people internally that cou…

Hi I work on Excel, can you write a summary of why that's important to you and send it to bgruenbaum@microsoft.com ? I'll get it in front of a PM. Alternatively PMs read all the feedback sent via the feedback UI on Excel web and desktop so you can use that instead if you prefer.

I can put this in an email if you want, but one good reason would be that my laptop is probably faster than the cloud compute that they are willing to give away to 365 subscribers. I can do much more inefficient things in a single cell if I know my laptop can pick up the slack :)

(Although, I'm guessing the reason they did it this way is so they could keep the execution model the same for Excel on the web? It's always running on the external service vs sometimes running locally and sometimes running externally.)

Re: Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel

#96

Post by baz00 » Tue, Aug 22, 2023, 2:33 PM UTC

layer8 wrote: post #46

cableshaft wrote: post #13

I wish it wasn't solely powered only by Microsoft Cloud and could support python running locally, but regardless I think this will still be huge and single-handedly modernizes Excel by a large margin. This alone could eliminate the need for websites that just want this sort of data. I can think of a past project at a previous job I did building an analytics website used only by a handful of people internally that cou…

It sort of makes sense to limit it to the cloud, because making Python an integral part of the Excel file format would reduce its portability and introduce all sorts of compatibility headaches going forward.

If you've ever dealt with AWS Lambda you will know what a versioning and upgrading shit show this is going to be wherever you stick it, be that client or cloud.

I worked on a very early python integration used as a workflow DSL back in 1998 and they had to dump it and write their own DSL in the end.

Re: Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel

#97

Post by Spivak » Tue, Aug 22, 2023, 2:33 PM UTC

0cf8612b2e1e wrote: post #64

abenga wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then they should embed the supported version of python in Excel and manage it automatically for them. This can be validated with Excel before release.

This seems like the only solution. Do not copy all of Python’s warts, but offer a curated experience. Microsoft Experience (TM) with fixed APIs, no package management or dealing with ecosystem churn.

It will never work because Python is the ecosystem. Having Python without the ability to tap the huge catalogue of existing software makes the integration worthless. The first thing someone will want to do is use Pandas on a live spreadsheet.

Re: Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel

#98

Post by ZeroCool2u » Tue, Aug 22, 2023, 2:34 PM UTC

cableshaft wrote: post #13

I wish it wasn't solely powered only by Microsoft Cloud and could support python running locally, but regardless I think this will still be huge and single-handedly modernizes Excel by a large margin. This alone could eliminate the need for websites that just want this sort of data. I can think of a past project at a previous job I did building an analytics website used only by a handful of people internally that cou…

Oh the cloud part is going to be a huge deal breaker in so many industries. This will automatically be blocked by default at my work place for certain.

Re: Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel

#99

Post by al_be_back » Tue, Aug 22, 2023, 2:36 PM UTC

very smart move!

clearly aimed at big business/enterprise customers, python's ecosystem of scientific & statistical libraries is massive

not so long ago they introduced Office Scripts and Power Automate, in essence coding macros in TypeScript (rather than VBA), again only for business/enterprise license users though.

Re: Microsoft is bringing Python to Excel

#100

Post by gpjt » Tue, Aug 22, 2023, 2:36 PM UTC

Back in 2005, some friends and I started a company called Resolver Systems to build a Python-enabled spreadsheet, which we called Resolver One. Sadly, it never took off in the marketplace, and we had to pivot; we would up creating PythonAnywhere, an online coding and hosting environment, which worked out pretty well and was acquired by Anaconda last year. And now, the circle is closed :-)

(Just for clarity: the team working on this inside Anaconda is entirely separate from the PythonAnywhere team. It would have made a perfect Hollywood-ready story if it had been the same people...)