“Why is such a basic spreadsheet function still not available?”

Re:“Why is such a basic spreadsheet function still not avail... by thejteam on Monday September 23, 2013 @07:23PM (#6434815)

I suppose the real answer is to just use Excel. The last time I used Google's spreadsheet was probably about 2 to 3 years ago and there were major deficiencies then. I used the spreadsheet in Open Office/Libre Office for awhile. And then I went back to Excel. It has been refreshing.

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Re:“Why is such a basic spreadsheet function still not avail... by anxiousest on Monday September 23, 2013 @07:37PM (#6434875)

Google Sheets has changed quite a bit over those "2 to 3 years", being a web app and all, Excel hasn't. I suggest taking second glance.

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Re:“Why is such a basic spreadsheet function still not avail... by dragonwriter on Monday September 23, 2013 @07:38PM (#6434880)

> Google Sheets has changed quite a bit over those "2 to 3 years", being a web app and all, Excel hasn't.

Excel 2013 actually has changed from Excel 2010.

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Re:“Why is such a basic spreadsheet function still not avail... by anxiousest on Monday September 23, 2013 @07:56PM (#6434940)

Perhaps, I doubt the change was as dramatic though, considering it's not just the app itself that underwent transformation but also browsers and the web platform as a whole. But then again we're talking about spreadsheet software.

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Re:“Why is such a basic spreadsheet function still not avail... by PeterisP on Monday September 23, 2013 @08:37PM (#6435099)

As the original article shows, it has a long way to go. I mean, Google Sheets is nice for many things, but to even try to replace Excel it needs to increase functionality tenfold - even LibreOffice isn't really there yet after all these years. And packing it with everything would likely make it a worse product for the actually intended Google Sheets audience due to more complexity.

Of all the 100 excel features everybody needs 3-4 - but each needs a different one, so you have to cover all of it to be an acceptable replacement. The original post is one example of such feature that apparently is 'must have' for someone. Database/sql integration for someone else. Solver functionality for yet other people. And so on.

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Re:“Why is such a basic spreadsheet function still not avail... by dragonwriter on Monday September 23, 2013 @10:04PM (#6435435)

> I mean, Google Sheets is nice for many things, but to even try to replace Excel it needs to increase functionality tenfold - even LibreOffice isn't really there yet after all these years.

Excel is a moving target. Nothing is ever going to "replace" Excel by simply chasing after it and trying to do everything Excel does in the way most comfortable to existing Excel users. Anything that's going to succeed as an Excel replacement will do enough of what Excel does in a way convenient to existing users and offer some compelling features that Excel doesn't have.

And there are always going to be people complaining about any replacement not mimicking some feature in the way they'd most prefer; even after a replacement succeeds -- it happened with WordPerfect users complaining about Word long after Word displaced WordPerfect and acheived dominance.

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