We (https://sheetjs.com/ https://sheetjs.com/) almost exclusively deal with those types of complex applications built in spreadsheets > they could be improved

We (https://sheetjs.com/ https://sheetjs.com/) almost exclusively deal with those types of complex applications built in spreadsheets > they could be improved a lot with minimal changes They can be improved for very specific use cases at the expense of others. > Making them more database-like and making table data first-class (at least you can make named tables in excel on windows) could be used to push people a bit more towards organised data, without changing how anything works. There are "database functions" like DAVERAGE, PivotTables and other systems for dealing with more structured data. Getting users to use them is a challenge outside of the scope of the tool. "You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink" > Half of the mess that makes excel hell comes from the fact it's too easy to put two tables of data + some random constants on a single sheet and refer to them by H3. Half of the reason Excel is so popular is the loose structure and the power that it enables. > Now it's hard to add more data, hard to move anything, and hard to create space which expands to the next row with existing formulas. Most of the hairy workbooks start as a solution to a problem at hand and eventually accumulate cruft after people try expanding it, not too dissimilar to other forms of software development. > Airtable (and Access) implements this idea, but unfortunately sacrifices the generic, free-form spreadsheet along the way. You either enforce the constraints and weaken the platform, or you give users the power to do what they want.