Spreadsheets are irreplaceable because they're the only no-code software development tool that's ever succeeded.
Nothing will ever replace spreadsheets, because the tech industry no longer believes in making products for power users. In modern thinking, any form of user training is an indication your product is too complicated, and any feature only used by 5% of users should be removed.
The idea of a product where users have to type in incantations like =VLOOKUP(A1,C2:D16,2,False) which they're just supposed to somehow know? A product that's essentially unusable on mobile? A product with features like 'Pivot Table' that only 1% of users ever use, and yet it's a vital core feature?
It's absurd. Only in 1970 could someone have conceived of such a thing.
Or any R or J user doing faster and secure stuff, even by using BioPerl/BioPython under a Jupyter instance. 1970's? This came from 2040, but brainwashed Excel users are still mentally locked in the 80's.
> So let me get this straight: Scientists would rather rename genes,
than to simply use a tool other than MS Excel?
It's not that they'd rather.
They understand that a trillion dollar corporation cannot supply the
most basic tool they need for work, despite trying for 40 years. They
just can't effect change. The real problem behind it all is that they
allow themselves to be bullied. Despite holding multiple PhDs they
cannot actually exercise rational choice.
The scientists work in an organisation where a suit called Kevin and a
middle aged lady in a cardigan called Mavis choose what software they
use. Kevin and Mavis are "IT experts".
Kevin and Mavis choose Microsoft because they think it is "reputable",
and they like the colours, and because HR have had "Microsoft Office"
as a mandatory hiring requirement since 1990.
Mostly though, they don't want to upset Colin who is head of IT, Colin
still thinks Windows XP was the best thing ever and goes a funny shade
of red when anyone mentions Linux (or anything else he doesn't
understand). Bless him, he's close to retirement anyway.
Meanwhile Tom the MD, whose "door is always open" invites the
scientists and engineers into a "consultation". They tell him that
Microsoft and Google offer 1990s solutions to twenty-first century
needs, that their products are unfit for purpose, unstable and
insecure too. They even produce a report of all the software they
need along with suppliers, budgets and installation guides. Colin has
gone a very worrying shade of purple.
Six months later the square root of fuck-all has happened. An
uncomfortale quiet hangs in the air. Someone nobody ever heard of
called Isabella, who actually works for "strategy and brand" in the
parent company - and is married to some Microsoft guy - over-rode the
whole thing.
Tom mumbles something about preferred suppliers and compliance. Kevin
and Mavis assure the scientists that Microsoft are going to fix
everything in the next update. Colin is restored to a smug pink.
Science will have to wait.
> a trillion dollar corporation cannot supply the most basic tool they need for work
Same - I'm still waiting for Microsoft to make me a decent set of drill bits. Can't believe a trillion dollar corporation cannot supply the most basic tool I need for work!
> Colin still thinks Windows XP was the best thing ever and goes a funny shade of red when anyone mentions Linux (or anything else he doesn't understand)
Circa 2000 I worked in a place with such a head of IT. After some effort I managed to get my work done by bringing in my own Linux laptop. But, connecting it to the network was strictly prohibited ("everyone knows that Linux is insecure"), and data had to be transferred by floppy disk to/from the rather unreliable networked Windows PC shared by me and two other scientists in the same office. This PC used to crash after each user logged out and required a reboot pretty much every time.
In mine (academic) they fired Mavis, Kevin and Colin (a week before
his retirement party) and moved the lot into "the cloud". What was
once the "campus network" vanished and became a wholly managed outpost
of Microsoft.
A lot of scientists are very bright people that can't invest the time to learn another tool that maybe is worse than Excel (e.g. Google Docs also does the gene-to-date swapping, try writting "SEPT2", the known gene [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SEPT2] in a cell), investing time and effort in changing pipelines that work for them.
Instead, the path of least resistance is to change the name of all known genes that cause problems with Excel. Biologist are changing and adding names all the time, so it's not like this is new. E.g. https://www.uniprot.org/uniprotkb/Q04609/entry#names_and_tax... shows you a gene with 5 names.
When I had this issue, the path of least resistance was to use Libre Office Calc. Of course, that's exactly the kind of application that my company now wants to remove from all systems for compliance with something called "Cyber Essentials".
Approximately 90%[1] of scientists who deal with this type of thing have in fact stopped using Excel (for this and other reasons), the problem is that the nature of this problem is such that the remaining 10% can really still screw it up for everyone. Also, next time you're having a problem with any of your tools, trying ditching that tool and picking something else. See if your productivity goes up or down.
Lol, yes. Scientists, engineers, accountants, businessmen, etc. all use Excel. They say the modern world is built upon spreadsheets (even broken ones that show the wrong data). I forgot who said this though...
It's not just a question of individual research groups deciding to use a different tool.
Even if you're conscientious enough to handle this issue, the automatic conversion could come and cause you problems from anyone you share data with: medical teams, grad students, administrators...
Perhaps there is a minority who thinks that automatic data conversion is unsound, and a majority who thinks it's 'pragmatic', and will let them move faster.
They could also just format that column explicitly, it's not really an issue of how much friction there is so much as that there is friction, it seems to me.
