[hoistbypetard]

For legacy spreadsheets, you're 100% correct. I'll need to keep a version of Excel around forever. If they price me out of 365 by making me pay for Copilot shit I don't use or want, a perpetual license to Office 2019 runs about $20 and will do that job for me.

For new work that I might have otherwise done in Excel, there are good options. Collabora works. Libre Office works. Google sheets works. And Grist is quite good, and self-hostable.

[tzs]

> If they price me out of 365 by making me pay for Copilot shit I don't use or want [...]

In case you aren't aware, when they try to sneak Copilot onto your plan you can get rid of it by going to your plan management page and canceling. One of the offers they should offer to try to get you to stay is your old plan without Copilot.

[moepstar]

> a perpetual license to Office 2019 runs about $20 and will do that job for me.

Isn’t that only perpetual as long as the activation servers are up?

[hoistbypetard]

Probably. I meant "perpetual" as opposed to "subscription" but I agree with your concern.

[nottorp]

You just stash a cracked version downloaded off some high seas site just in case.

[sneak]

None of the things you listed are suitable replacements for Excel. None.

It has nothing to do with existing files/compatibility. Excel is unparalleled.

[hoistbypetard]

That depends on your workload. I've been using Excel since 1993, and I find the things I've listed help me get things done just as well as Excel does, unless I have a pile of macros and vbscript I need to interop with.

This is not theoretical; I learned it by needing to get shit done in a context where having an activated copy of Excel wasn't practical. Excel was paralleled and in one case surpassed.

[array_key_first]

The solution is actually just not using Excel. If you're essentially using Excel as a LOB backend and database, that should probably not be in Excel.

It's fine if you have a few formulas. As soon as you're busting out macros it's time to sunset the workbook and make an application. There's a lot of God Excel workbooks sitting around on share drives with no audibility or quality control.

[justapassenger]

Yes, there's many many cases that should likely not be using Excel.

But given that Excel is the second-best tool for everything, world runs on it.

And when you try to build systems to replace Excel for a specific task, you quickly learn how extremely powerful Excel is and how hard is to replace it and add value that customers would care about.

[array_key_first]

I've been there, the problem is that replacements are not as versatile or "floppy". But that's also a good thing, because Excel is too versatile to the point where most workbooks are filled with bugs on top of bugs and nobody cares.

[justapassenger]

Yes, bugs in sheets are worst part of excel, by far.

But many end users prefer dealing with bugs than with inflexible software that doesn’t understand all the different ways how real world is messy and hard to model.

I hate using Excel. But I 100% understand why world runs on it.

[baranul]

Have to disagree. It depends on what you are doing. That the alternatives can be replacements, including the open source ones, is relative and should be looked at as a percentage.

If you listed out all the things that Excel can do, we might find that the alternative is at 80% or so (just a number), with some additional things that Excel can't do. That 80% could be good enough to switch. It should not be looked at as "all or nothing", especially for every person or business.

[chris_wot]

Can it open Quattro Pro files?

[stOneskull]

A whole lot of accountants/bookkeepers (including I) will totally disagree with you. LibreOffice is very good.. and not just Calc either. Writing a novel in Writer is a pleasure.

More people should use and contribute to LibreOffice!