spreadsheets @ enterprise hackers meetup

Analyzing & visualizing spreadsheets Felienne Hermans (@felienne)

Spreadsheets are the aether of enterprise software

Spreadsheets are like aether:

They are

omnipresent,

invisible and

used for communication

The European Spreadsheet Risk Interest Group (Eusprig.org) collects horror stories

So why use them if they are so

error-prone?

So why use them if they are so

error-prone?

Neckbeard hacker often ponders

So why use them if they are so

error-prone?

Neckbeard hacker often ponders

Y U making spreadsheet?

So why use them if they are so

error-prone?

Neckbeard hacker often ponders

Y U making spreadsheet? Y U no love C++?

Spreadsheets are like prostitution: people are going to want to do it!

Spreadsheets are like prostitution: people are going to want to do it!

So lets try to understand the

problem and solve it, rather than

prohibit it.

The Dutch view :-)

Spreadsheets are like prostitution: people are going to want to do it!

So lets try to understand the

problem and solve it, rather than

prohibit it.

The Dutch view :-)

So we studied spreadsheets in a

financial company and found the

following

Only 33% of spreadsheets has a manual

Spreadsheets can have a long life, 5 years on average

Average sheet is used by 12 different people

No documentation, errors, long life It looks like…

No documentation, errors, long life It looks like software!

Typical software maintenance problems also occur in spreadsheets

Because of their lifespan, spreadsheets are often transferred.

Typical software maintenance problems also occur in spreadsheets

Because of their lifespan, spreadsheets are often transferred.

Initially, you are happy when you

get a spreadsheet from a

colleague, because you don;t

have to built is.

Typical software maintenance problems also occur in spreadsheets

But we all know how this story ends

Typical software maintenance problems also occur in spreadsheets

But we all know how this story ends

In despair

Spreadsheet users lack tool support

We believe spreadsheet users, as

software engineers do, need

support for understanding

spreadsheets they receive.

We believe spreadsheet users, as

software engineers do, need

support for understanding

spreadsheets they receive.

Compared to an IDE, which has

metrics, visualization, tests and

refactoring support all built-in.

We believe spreadsheet users, as

software engineers do, need

support for understanding

spreadsheets they receive.

Compared to an IDE, which has

metrics, visualization, tests and

refactoring support all built-in.

The support in Excel and other

spreadsheet systems is quite weak.

We took Fowler’s smells and adapted them to be applicable on spreadsheets

We started to solve this

This formula suffers from a smell

This formula suffers from a smell which can be refactored

We built a tool to detect and refactor spreadsheet smells

Spreadsheet users understand and even embrace this

Probably because they don’t have to meet him anymore

But seriously! Empowering end-users is key in modern enterprise software