Rapid Prototyping with Excel
Although I am not a big fan of Microsoft (I prefer computers and software with an apple on the cover - at the present they are healthier), I made an interesting discovery during the last two weeks.
I needed to develop a tool to test and evaluate a methodology we had constructed. The tool had to be easy to use, adaptable, and with little or no installation efforts. These requirements led to two options: a web-based application based on a existing prototype or - as a colleague of mine suggested - a solution made in Excel(!).
I figured out, that extending the existing web-based prototype would require some extensive reprogramming. Thus, I gave the Excel way a try. After getting used to VBA (Most of the features of Excel do not need programming, though.) and its use in Excel, I was utterly surprised:
Until then, my perception of Excel was that it is a worksheet tool: creating and summing up tables, drawing charts, etc. However, it can do a lot more. Practically it has all the features you need for creating a simple business application prototype: looking up elements in tables, creating new lists automatically, creating select boxes, combining elements based on certain rules, …
The best “features” of Excel however are that it is available virtually anywhere and everbody knows how to use it. Furthermore, you can add changes quickly without time-costly additions to the GUI. All in all, a solid rapid prototyping platform
On the downside, programming VBA is not really fun work. It lacks a lot of features, you are accustomed to from Java or C# (OK, that is not a surprise since it is far older.).
