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I've been pondering similar ideas as this for a while. I think you are correct by starting with Excel files. What I've been hammock thinking is a way to bridge

I've been pondering similar ideas as this for a while. I think you are correct by starting with Excel files. What I've been hammock thinking is a way to bridge the gap between spreadsheets and what we tend to consider code. Why can't we iterate spreadsheets to something that makes it easier to: diff, review, separate logic from data, track in version control, write new functions/macros, re-use, package and distribute. I think as more people will need to use computers more, that everyone will need to have access to some form of programming skills. I think spreadsheets are a successful mechanism for people to rapidly manipulate data, but they deteriorate quickly with complexity. A tool that doesn't throw out the baby with the bathwater could help people ramp up to programming much easier. If you teach someone to write a function that operates on a medium they already know like a spreadsheet, it is a lot less intimidating than writing a .py file, and downloading python and learning what compile is.

TuringTest 5y ago
There's a lot of thinking around those lines, specially since the work of Bret Victor on data-rich programmable environments. Spreadsheet-like IDEs are the most logical direction to meet that vision, specially when you want to attract non-programmers; figuring out the language syntax and the runtime execution model are the hardest parts of learning to program, and spreadsheets minimize both. I put my bet on code notebooks, of the functional reactive variety. They have the same interaction model of the spreadsheet, intermixing data and code in the same environment, and they allow you to grow a program iteratively with cells acting as reusable objects - a simpler metaphor than OOP, but equally powerful. Data scientists are already making good use of them, and it's easy to think that these notebooks will be getting more and more of the debugging and DevOps functions of traditional IDEs.

TuringTest 5y ago

There's a lot of thinking around those lines, specially since the work of Bret Victor on data-rich programmable environments. Spreadsheet-like IDEs are the most logical direction to meet that vision, specially when you want to attract non-programmers; figuring out the language syntax and the runtime execution model are the hardest parts of learning to program, and spreadsheets minimize both. I put my bet on code notebooks, of the functional reactive variety. They have the same interaction model of the spreadsheet, intermixing data and code in the same environment, and they allow you to grow a program iteratively with cells acting as reusable objects - a simpler metaphor than OOP, but equally powerful. Data scientists are already making good use of them, and it's easy to think that these notebooks will be getting more and more of the debugging and DevOps functions of traditional IDEs.