> “The city teams only know how to use Excel, just make it like Excel.”
> “Why can you see the formulas?”
> “You said to make it just like Excel.”
I can't keep up with the espionage story that followed but I had this conversation more than once in my professional career.
The first time I sat as a junior dev on a multi-month project replacing a excel spreadsheet for financial controlling of data centers that only one person who was going to retire understood with a web-based solution.
They were quite proud that they were going to get a "modern" solution.
Then they wanted me to make it like excel. What followed was evaluating every fricking excel JavaScript library out there at this time, going for one and started duct taping all the missing pieces.
They were pleased but the look was off. It wasn't excel. I slapped some styles on it coming quite close.
I was not prepared for what happened during the next presentation: They hated it because they wanted a modern web based solution (their words, not mine) and what they got was a poor excel knockoff running in their Internet Explorers. Tables are so 90s.
I remember the pain so vividly that I regard "just make it like excel" as some kind of forming meme for my career till today.
> “Why can you see the formulas?”
> “You said to make it just like Excel.”
I can't keep up with the espionage story that followed but I had this conversation more than once in my professional career.
The first time I sat as a junior dev on a multi-month project replacing a excel spreadsheet for financial controlling of data centers that only one person who was going to retire understood with a web-based solution.
They were quite proud that they were going to get a "modern" solution.
Then they wanted me to make it like excel. What followed was evaluating every fricking excel JavaScript library out there at this time, going for one and started duct taping all the missing pieces.
They were pleased but the look was off. It wasn't excel. I slapped some styles on it coming quite close.
I was not prepared for what happened during the next presentation: They hated it because they wanted a modern web based solution (their words, not mine) and what they got was a poor excel knockoff running in their Internet Explorers. Tables are so 90s.
I remember the pain so vividly that I regard "just make it like excel" as some kind of forming meme for my career till today.