It could be useful if there was a C program you would like to run, but the only tool available was Excel. Maybe strict IT admins had disabled the ability to run anything but Office, and even VBA macros were disabled. Although in that scenario it would be better if the compiler was written in C and could bootstrap itself.

I think we need a compiler written in excel!

Sheets for modules. A column for each function. A row for each line of code. I weirdly would love to see this.

That is pretty much how macros worked in Excel 4.

I once wrote an x86 assembler in Lotus 123.

I don't mean to put down OP but isn't it kinda straight forward since assembly is just a 1:1 correspondence with machine instructions? simply pasting the assembly program into a column then looking up each mnemonic in an association table linking each mnemonic with it's machine representation and writing the result into a new column would work. The Labels->Addresses mapping is another lookup but over the program column itself, looking up the row where the label is defined and using that as the offset from the start address of the program. An assembler is just a fancy string processor, Excel is mighty good at string processing.

What I would bet a respectable sum on is that you can't parse/process/interpret even the simplest recursive languages (e.g. arithemtic, Expr ::= Expr + Expr | NUMBER) from pure Excel. Forget expressing the algorithm, there isn't even a suitable data structure to iterate over.

Apologies, this was over 30 years ago!

IIRC it made extensive use of lookup tables, both building them and being driven by them.

It wasn't a complete implementation, but it proved the theory and scratched an itch.

That's really cool :) and makes perfect sense.

I can see what you mean about it scratching an itch. Definitely piqued my interest!

(Varying "citation needed" didn't quite convey genuine curiosity the way I thought it would.)

Yes, but can it run DOOM?

That's always the question!

Here is a video of a doom-alike in excel, explained by someone with a bird on his head. He's not clippy, but a real person with a bird on his head. [1]

Here is a video displaying a walk-through of the Excel easter egg that showed the Hall of Tortured Souls! [2]

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s105jek4WUI

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGqD-J_pRvs

The bird moves to his hand halfway through.

Thankfully, the bird's location doesn't affect the graphical rendering power of Excel.

[fixed]

Thanks!

Excel 95 contained an Easter egg which was a doom like game.

It was 3D but it wasn’t really Doom like. It reminded me more of Magic Carpet.

There was a Windows 95 screen saver that was Doom like though.

Excel 98 had an Easter egg which was like Magic Carpet! If I recall correctly, you fly over a twisted purple and orange landscape while an obelisk emits the credits.

95 had the “Hall of Tortured Souls”—a 2.5D first-person walker—which was more Doomlike.

Oh yeah. I completely forgot about that one

https://youtu.be/kK0M74E8PS4

There was no Excel 98.

They mean the excel included in Office `97. That's the disk I'm holding in my hand and that's the version I experienced the weird flying easter egg.

Whoops! Yes, thanks.

There was on the Mac.