We were already used to see requirements specified as powerpoint files but for me, seeing models specified in an excel file was a first. A company said they would send us the domain model of their software application and to my surprise what I got was an excel file with a simple class-attribute structure like the one I replicate here.
Angel López already defended the idea that the format of input models should be flexible and textual models are becoming more and more popular every day but models in excel?? It’s difficult to imagine when this is a better solution than other possible formats (from modeling tools to napkins). Nevertheless, at least for one company, excel as a modeling tool clearly works.
FNR Pearl Chair. Head of the Software Engineering RDI Unit at LIST. Affiliate Professor at University of Luxembourg. More about me.
I’m surprised that you are surprised. I think Excel (and their open-source or Cloud service counterparts) might just be the most-often used modeling tool out there, precisely because it gives some structure (the grid) but doesn’t force you to define a rigid structure up-front and live by it. Also, there’s quite some expressivity in there through formulas and macros. I know people have modeled e.g. the complete Dutch pension law in one gargantuan Excel sheet. It’s also readily interchangeable without too much fuss through CSV.
Always learning new things 🙂 . Better late than never!
I agree with Meinte …
And, I’ve designed a report solution that use Excel worksheet to save all of the data, the models of data and format for a report, in many years ago. 🙂
Some time ago we had to send the data model of a given project to some members of the IT staff of a bank. They had to check whether the model was correct for them.
The curious thing is that the first thing they did to “ease their understanding” of the model was to translate it into a set of Excel datasheets (one per each class in the model).
I guess that there’s more than one way to skin a cat 🙂 …
In the end DSL means language follows structure, and if it’s tree-like, ok, Excel. Think, a huge part of a software’s structure is of this kind (like sets, lists, trees).
Nevertheless, what do they do when structures become more complex then that?
Like the relations among the entities? Then, I think, Excel is highly inappropriate, and all these masterminds that say they keep the overview without any kind of ERD, are simply not aware of all their inconsistencies.
Have fun
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