5 ms·

I'll join in with a bit of show-and-tell of my own, if I may. I'm working on a plugin for Excel for dev's and other technical people. It lets the user use SQL

by anakic 9y ago

I'll join in with a bit of show-and-tell of my own, if I may. I'm working on a plugin for Excel for dev's and other technical people. It lets the user use SQL and C# in Excel, connect to various types of databases and move data in either direction, and provides a runtime for automation. The idea is basically to let tech users use their existing skills to make life easier. Main areas of use are: - process (live) data in Excel via SQL and C#/linq - move data between Excel and databases - fetch data from various sources using .net (e.g. get data from a AD, file system, REST etc. in a few lines of code) - replace VBA with C# and .NET for automation It's also very useful for prototyping. Business logic goes inside C# scripts, and Excel takes care of user input, displaying results, data binding (formulas and graphs) and data storage. It's commercial but freemium, the url is http://www.querystorm.com http://www.querystorm.com. I posted about it a few times: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15670030 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15670030 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11583488 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11583488 Here's an intro video: https://vimeo.com/242216594 https://vimeo.com/242216594

0x445442 9y ago
Yeah, I've always thought with the types of integration hooks you're talking about that Excel could serve as a front end for many enterprise/back office apps. My first heavy use of Excel was in a thermodynamics class in college. We modeled heat gradients for various HVAC systems with Excel. After that, I used it to calculate stresses and strains of different structures using each cell as a node in finite element analysis model.
bsenftner 9y ago
I did something like this in 2002 for a VFX house; but it was loading a DLL that hot loaded other DLLs, queried the routines and exposed them as Excel functions. Through that I pulled in a stochastic modeling framework I wrote, and pulled in 5 years of the studio's timecard records to create a production forecasting system, right down to selecting the correct staff for each position, with backup people, for 1200 digital artists. The Excel "spreadheet" was something like 250 MB when saved with a film production in it.
fjsolwmv 9y ago
.NET and ODBC already provide C# and SQL, no?
- outsideoflife 9y ago
  Yes...but. You can't do a SQL join between the data in an excel table and a remote database via a nice GUI front end using just .NET and ODBC. I am evaluating this product at the moment, and it looks really useful for Finance/analyst types
microcolonel 9y ago
Yes, I saw your tool before. I recommended it to somebody a couple months ago and they're very happy with it for their use case. It is brave of you to integrate directly with Excel, and I commend you for that. Maybe some day I will work up the courage to do something other than basic one-way import.

by anakic 9y ago

0x445442 9y ago

Yeah, I've always thought with the types of integration hooks you're talking about that Excel could serve as a front end for many enterprise/back office apps. My first heavy use of Excel was in a thermodynamics class in college. We modeled heat gradients for various HVAC systems with Excel. After that, I used it to calculate stresses and strains of different structures using each cell as a node in finite element analysis model.

bsenftner 9y ago

I did something like this in 2002 for a VFX house; but it was loading a DLL that hot loaded other DLLs, queried the routines and exposed them as Excel functions. Through that I pulled in a stochastic modeling framework I wrote, and pulled in 5 years of the studio's timecard records to create a production forecasting system, right down to selecting the correct staff for each position, with backup people, for 1200 digital artists. The Excel "spreadheet" was something like 250 MB when saved with a film production in it.

fjsolwmv 9y ago

.NET and ODBC already provide C# and SQL, no?

outsideoflife 9y ago
Yes...but. You can't do a SQL join between the data in an excel table and a remote database via a nice GUI front end using just .NET and ODBC. I am evaluating this product at the moment, and it looks really useful for Finance/analyst types

microcolonel 9y ago

Yes, I saw your tool before. I recommended it to somebody a couple months ago and they're very happy with it for their use case. It is brave of you to integrate directly with Excel, and I commend you for that. Maybe some day I will work up the courage to do something other than basic one-way import.