Related papers: Spreadsheet Structure Discovery with Logic Program…
Spreadsheets are the go-to tool for computerized calculation and modelling, but are hard to comprehend and adapt after reaching a certain complexity. In general, cognition of complex systems is facilitated by having a higher order mental…
In this paper, we discuss the problem of the software engineering of a class of business spreadsheet models. A methodology for structured software development is proposed, which is based on structured analysis of data, represented as…
The paper presents two complementary strategies for identifying errors in spreadsheet programs. The strategies presented are grounded on the assumption that spreadsheets are software, albeit of a different nature than conventional…
A spreadsheet is remarkably flexible in representing various forms of structured data, but the individual cells have no knowledge of the larger structures of which they may form a part. This can hamper comprehension and increase formula…
Spreadsheet engineering adapts the lessons of software engineering to spreadsheets, providing eight principles as a framework for organizing spreadsheet programming recommendations. Spreadsheets raise issues inadequately addressed by…
Refactoring is a change made to the internal structure of software to make it easier to understand and cheaper to modify without changing its observable behaviour. A database refactoring is a small change to the database schema which…
Spreadsheets offer a supremely successful democratisation platform, placing the manipulation and presentation of numbers within the grasp of users that have little or no mathematical expertise or IT experience. What appears to be almost…
We believe the error prone nature of traditional spreadsheets is due to their low level of abstraction. End user programmers are forced to construct their data models from low level cells which we define as "a data container or manipulator…
This Paper summarises the operation of software developed for the analysis of workbook structure. This comprises: the identification of layout in terms of filled areas formed into "Stripes", the identification of all the Formula…
We have developed the Model Master (MM) language for describing spreadsheets, and tools for converting MM programs to and from spreadsheets. The MM decompiler translates a spreadsheet into an MM program which gives a concise summary of its…
Spreadsheet engineering methodologies are diverse and sometimes contradictory. It is difficult for spreadsheet developers to identify a spreadsheet engineering methodology that is appropriate for their class of spreadsheet, with its unique…
Reversible debugging is becoming increasingly popular for locating the source of errors. This technique proposes a more natural approach to debugging, where one can explore a computation from the observable misbehaviour backwards to the…
Modern spreadsheet systems can be used to implement complex spreadsheet applications including data sheets, customized user forms and executable procedures written in a scripting language. These applications are often developed by…
Most spreadsheet surveys both for reporting use and error focus on the practical application of the spreadsheet in a particular industry. Typically these studies will illustrate that a particular percentage of spreadsheets are used for…
Spreadsheet programs, artifacts developed by non-programmers, are used for a variety of important tasks and decisions. Yet a significant proportion of them have severe quality problems. To address this issue, our previous work presented an…
The spreadsheet application is among the most widely used computing tools in modern society. It provides excellent usability and usefulness, and it easily enables a non-programmer to perform programming-like tasks in a visual tabular "pen…
Spreadsheets are one of the most widely used programming environments, and are widely deployed in domains like finance where errors can have catastrophic consequences. We present a static analysis specifically designed to find spreadsheet…
The difference between surface and deep structures of a spreadsheet is a major cause of difficulty in checking spreadsheets. After a brief survey of current methods of checking (or debugging) spreadsheets, new visual methods of showing the…
Programming in Prolog is hard for programmers that are used to procedural coding. In this manual the method of drawing search trees is introduced with the aim to get a better understanding of how Prolog works. After giving a first example…
Spreadsheet programming is challenging. Programmers use spreadsheet programming knowledge (e.g., formulas) and problem-solving skills to combine actions into complex tasks. Advancements in large language models have introduced language…