Related papers: Detecting Errors in Spreadsheets
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…
Principles, Techniques and Practice of Spreadsheet Style
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…
Heavy use of spreadsheets by organisations bears many potential risks such as errors, ambiguity, data loss, duplication, and fraud. In this paper these risks are briefly outlined along with their available mitigation methods such as:…
Existing approaches for detecting anomalies in spreadsheets can help to discover faults, but they are often applied too late in the spreadsheet lifecycle. By contrast, our approach detects anomalies immediately whenever users change their…
This paper presents a taxonomy for analytical spreadsheet models. It considers both the use case that a spreadsheet is meant to serve, and the engineering resources devoted to its development. We extend a previous three-type taxonomy, to…
A huge amount of data is everyday managed in large organizations in many critical business sectors with the support of spreadsheet applications. The process of elaborating spreadsheet data is often performed in a distributed, collaborative…
Very little is known about the process by which end-user developers detect and correct spreadsheet errors. Any research pertaining to the development of spreadsheet testing methodologies or auditing tools would benefit from information on…
Legacy spreadsheets are both, an asset, and an enduring problem concerning spreadsheets in business. To make spreadsheets stay alive and remain correct, comprehension of a given spreadsheet is highly important. Visualization techniques…
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…
Computer programs do not always work as expected. In fact, ominous warnings about the desperate state of the software industry continue to be released with almost ritualistic regularity. In this paper, we look at the 60 years history of…
Spreadsheets are used to develop application software that is distributed to users. Unfortunately, the users often have the ability to change the programming statements ("source code") of the spreadsheet application. This causes a host of…
Spreadsheets are widely used, and studies have shown that most end-user spreadsheets contain nontrivial errors. To improve end-users productivity, recent research proposes the use of a model-driven engineering approach to spreadsheets. In…
Spreadsheets in financial markets are frequently used as database, calculator and reporting application combined. This paper describes an alternative approach in which spreadsheet design and database technology have been brought together in…
In this paper, we report some on-going focused research, but are further keen to set it in the context of a proposed bigger picture, as follows. There is a certain depressing pattern about the attitude of industry to spreadsheet error…
Spreadsheet audit and review procedures are an essential part of almost all City of London financial transactions. Structured processes are used to discover errors in large financial spreadsheets underpinning major transactions of all…
Because spreadsheets have a large and growing importance in real-world work, their contents need to be controlled and validated. Generally spreadsheets have been difficult to verify, since data and executable information are stored…
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…
Human error research on overconfidence supports the benefits of early visibility of defects and disciplined development. If risk to the enterprise is to be reduced, individuals need to become aware of the reality of the quality of their…
We intend to demonstrate the innate problems with existing spreadsheet products and to show how to tackle these issues using a new type of spreadsheet program called Resolver. It addresses the issues head-on and thereby moves the 1980's…