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The descriptions of the problems make it sound a little like algorithmic puzzles but your only tool is Excel instead of some programming language… Excel is pret

The descriptions of the problems make it sound a little like algorithmic puzzles but your only tool is Excel instead of some programming language… Excel is pretty amazing in what you can do; I’ve regretted having to use Google Sheets for the last few years.

Bridged7756 9mo ago
Yup. Not too long ago they added Python scripting. Definitely beats the weird cloud scripting you have to do with Google Sheets.
- HPsquared 9mo ago
  Excel Python runs in the cloud. It is nicely integrated though.
  - NetMageSCW 9mo ago
    I wish they had gone for embedding .Net locally instead.
shagie 9mo ago
> but your only tool is Excel instead of some programming language There is little difference between (if (> a b) c d) and =IF((A1 > B1), C1, D1) Excel is the most widely installed functional programming language IDE.
- OoooooooO 9mo ago
  Change the language of your Windows system to anything but English and then open your Excel file with formulas again.
  - mmooss 9mo ago
    ok, what happens? (I'm not messing around on my system right now ...)
    - shrx 9mo ago
      Localization of formulas. On my system, all parameter-separating commas have to be replaced with semicolons.
      - mmooss 9mo ago
        That is shocking. Excel is used by every international organization, probably. How do they manage the localization?
        phinnaeus 9mo ago
        Maybe the files store the formulas in an intermediate format that can be localized by the client
        mmooss 9mo ago
        The GGP says, > On my system, all parameter-separating commas have to be replaced with semicolons. That implies the user has to manually change the syntax.
        ygra 9mo ago
        The formulae are indeed stored in the same format, regardless of language. For rendering and parsing in the UI they use translated function names and the field separator (commma in English, but semicolon in many other languages because decimal numbers use a comma there). It does irk me a bit (though not as much as the translated VBA back in the day). But that's probably because I know English, I often look for solutions to my problems in English, not in my native language, and then would have to mentally translate that back. But that's perhaps a burden for programmers more than for typical users. A few thoughts: • it's been that way for decades, at this point. So changing it would annoy a lot of users • the problem with comma and semicolon would remain unless you want entering numbers normally and within a formula to be different. I'm not sure that's good in a product built around numbers (and often numbers that should be written and formatted like any other number in that country). • making it configurable might work, but that then requires more testing, although sometimes it's not clear how much testing Microsoft is still doing, so that might not be much of a point. But adding options also has UX limits and not just in the length of the settings screen.
  - NooneAtAll3 9mo ago
    I don't get your point programming languages aren't allowed to be in non-english somehow?
  - hidd 9mo ago
    When I worked at a university's tech support, this was a recurring problem. People made grade lists in Excel, then imported them into the digital learning environment, which occasionally was set to a different language. This meant that the decimal point would be disregarded, and e.g. an 8.5/10 would be imported as an 85 (which got clamped to 10). Maximum grades for everyone, confused students and teachers :')
    - tstenner 9mo ago
      Even better: grades range from 1.0 (best) to 5.0 (failed) with partial grades (.3, .7) in-between. Caused a few problems when a 1.3 got interpreted as the first May and converted to the number of days between the epoch and the first ofay of that year.
  - KellyCriterion 9mo ago
    Classic one++ (-:
- lmz 9mo ago
  It even has LAMBDA now: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/lambda-function-bd212d27-1cd1-4321-a34a-ccbf254b8b67 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/lambda-function-b...

Bridged7756 9mo ago

Yup. Not too long ago they added Python scripting. Definitely beats the weird cloud scripting you have to do with Google Sheets.

HPsquared 9mo ago
Excel Python runs in the cloud. It is nicely integrated though.
- NetMageSCW 9mo ago
  I wish they had gone for embedding .Net locally instead.

shagie 9mo ago

> but your only tool is Excel instead of some programming language There is little difference between (if (> a b) c d) and =IF((A1 > B1), C1, D1) Excel is the most widely installed functional programming language IDE.

OoooooooO 9mo ago
Change the language of your Windows system to anything but English and then open your Excel file with formulas again.
- mmooss 9mo ago
  ok, what happens? (I'm not messing around on my system right now ...)
  - shrx 9mo ago
    Localization of formulas. On my system, all parameter-separating commas have to be replaced with semicolons.
    - mmooss 9mo ago
      That is shocking. Excel is used by every international organization, probably. How do they manage the localization?
      - phinnaeus 9mo ago
        Maybe the files store the formulas in an intermediate format that can be localized by the client
        mmooss 9mo ago
        The GGP says, > On my system, all parameter-separating commas have to be replaced with semicolons. That implies the user has to manually change the syntax.
        ygra 9mo ago
        The formulae are indeed stored in the same format, regardless of language. For rendering and parsing in the UI they use translated function names and the field separator (commma in English, but semicolon in many other languages because decimal numbers use a comma there). It does irk me a bit (though not as much as the translated VBA back in the day). But that's probably because I know English, I often look for solutions to my problems in English, not in my native language, and then would have to mentally translate that back. But that's perhaps a burden for programmers more than for typical users. A few thoughts: • it's been that way for decades, at this point. So changing it would annoy a lot of users • the problem with comma and semicolon would remain unless you want entering numbers normally and within a formula to be different. I'm not sure that's good in a product built around numbers (and often numbers that should be written and formatted like any other number in that country). • making it configurable might work, but that then requires more testing, although sometimes it's not clear how much testing Microsoft is still doing, so that might not be much of a point. But adding options also has UX limits and not just in the length of the settings screen.
- NooneAtAll3 9mo ago
  I don't get your point programming languages aren't allowed to be in non-english somehow?
- hidd 9mo ago
  When I worked at a university's tech support, this was a recurring problem. People made grade lists in Excel, then imported them into the digital learning environment, which occasionally was set to a different language. This meant that the decimal point would be disregarded, and e.g. an 8.5/10 would be imported as an 85 (which got clamped to 10). Maximum grades for everyone, confused students and teachers :')
  - tstenner 9mo ago
    Even better: grades range from 1.0 (best) to 5.0 (failed) with partial grades (.3, .7) in-between. Caused a few problems when a 1.3 got interpreted as the first May and converted to the number of days between the epoch and the first ofay of that year.
- KellyCriterion 9mo ago
  Classic one++ (-:
lmz 9mo ago
It even has LAMBDA now: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/lambda-function-bd212d27-1cd1-4321-a34a-ccbf254b8b67 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/lambda-function-b...