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Bricklin didn't invent spreadsheets, they had existed for hundreds of years. He wasn't even the first to use a digital computer to implement one. He was, howe

Bricklin didn't invent spreadsheets, they had existed for hundreds of years. He wasn't even the first to use a digital computer to implement one. He was, however, in the right place at the right time to put spreadsheets in the hands of many more people in a much more convenient and powerful form. See: http://www.dssresources.com/history/sshistory.html http://www.dssresources.com/history/sshistory.html

adventured 7y ago
Bricklin invented the software spreadsheet. It's only a need to debase Bricklin's obvious credit, that leads to the claim that comparable spreadsheets existed prior to VisiCalc. They did not. That's precisely why it was such a marvel. Whatever existed prior to VisiCalc, was not similar to the spreadsheet as we know it and define it today. It's a path that VisiCalc blazed, to universal credit by everyone that was in the industry at the time and helped pioneer software.
- jhayward 7y ago
  What, specifically, are you asserting that Bricklin invented? It wasn't the visual paradigm of a tabular presentation. It wasn't the two-formed concept of cells having both values and formulas, or that the formulas could be stated in terms of other cell's values. It wasn't that you could do what accountants had done for centuries using the same tools. It wasn't that the same type of calculations could be done using a computer. So what we're left is that he took a visual concept and implemented it on a screen. I don't think that qualifies as "invention", myself. It is re-implementation, copying, or something that doesn't involve a conceptual leap. He was in the right place at the right time to spot the technological opportunity, and we are all better for that.
- StudyAnimal 7y ago
  LANPAR was invented in 1969, well before VisiCalc: http://www.dssresources.com/history/sshistory.html http://www.dssresources.com/history/sshistory.html

adventured 7y ago

Bricklin invented the software spreadsheet. It's only a need to debase Bricklin's obvious credit, that leads to the claim that comparable spreadsheets existed prior to VisiCalc. They did not. That's precisely why it was such a marvel. Whatever existed prior to VisiCalc, was not similar to the spreadsheet as we know it and define it today. It's a path that VisiCalc blazed, to universal credit by everyone that was in the industry at the time and helped pioneer software.

jhayward 7y ago
What, specifically, are you asserting that Bricklin invented? It wasn't the visual paradigm of a tabular presentation. It wasn't the two-formed concept of cells having both values and formulas, or that the formulas could be stated in terms of other cell's values. It wasn't that you could do what accountants had done for centuries using the same tools. It wasn't that the same type of calculations could be done using a computer. So what we're left is that he took a visual concept and implemented it on a screen. I don't think that qualifies as "invention", myself. It is re-implementation, copying, or something that doesn't involve a conceptual leap. He was in the right place at the right time to spot the technological opportunity, and we are all better for that.
StudyAnimal 7y ago
LANPAR was invented in 1969, well before VisiCalc: http://www.dssresources.com/history/sshistory.html http://www.dssresources.com/history/sshistory.html