Ask HN: Excel to graphical data model?
My company makes graphical data manipulation / modeling software called Transdata. Basically, you draw a flowchart to create a data process rather than writing code.
Probably the single most common reason people give for not buying our software is something along the lines of "we use Excel for solving problem X, and while we hate it, we don't want to start over from scratch even if a new tool would be better in the long run." This is sometimes followed up with "can your tool just convert my existing spreadsheet into a graphical model?"
So I'm looking for pros / cons of actually building that conversion tool into our software. Once a spreadsheet was converted, it could be modified / added to graphically and automated if desired.
- Would this actually get people to ditch Excel? Obviously, this could be a huge market. - What capabilities would you need / want to consider using such a tool?