Since the dawn of the computer age, finding the right automated business productivity tools has been a big problem that has plagued all businesses no matter what industry they are in. Solving this problem efficiently can make or break a company. The first step is to identify the problems that need solved, then find the right tools to solve the problems. There are basically two ways to solve these problems. The first choice is to purchase a prebuilt system. There are a couple of problems that businesses have encountered over the years. The first is that these systems can be very expensive, and the second problem is that they are not easily customized. You basically must run your business by way the tool was designed, not your way. The second solution is to build your own system either internally or by finding a third party to build it. This is very expensive and time consuming. It can take months to years to complete, requiring a highly technical staff to complete the task. The other problem is that once the system is deployed, it requires a similar team to make any changes as your business evolves and changes. What if anyone inside an organization could create an application? That is the question we asked ourselves as we set out to find a solution to this age-old problem. We want to change the way software is developed in the future. With the right tool, we estimate that 80% of all applications can be written without the assistance of a developer. Anyone should be able to write an application.
We have 25 years of experience creating, marketing and selling development tools all around the world. Our goal was always to create tools that required as little work as possible for the developer. We realized that we could take these learned skills and make a tool that anyone can use wish no coding required. Those 25 years revolved mostly around Spreadsheets and how to create powerful, programmable Spreadsheets for developers, since Spreadsheets are the most productive tool over the past 40 years for allowing non-technical people to be very productive. By creating a Spreadsheet that was as powerful as Excel and listening to our own customers who were developers and think a little different than most Excel users, we learned to appreciate the strengths of current spreadsheets on the market while quickly discovering that they haven’t really changed much over the past 40 years other than some new features here and there. By listening to our customer’s needs and wishes, we really began to open our eyes to the weaknesses of spreadsheets and how they can be improved to solve even the most complex problems.
SpiderSheet is a business productivity platform that allows anyone in an organization to create a business application by using a familiar Spreadsheet experience. In other words, SpiderSheet is a database-driven collaborative work platform and productivity tool with the ease of a spreadsheet Why the name SpiderSheet? We want to build a (spider) web around all of an organization’s challenges by creating a powerful, easy to use platform that will solve most needs. We want an organization and teams within the organization to create their own self-contained webs of productivity tools. We also want this platform to be able to branch to other legacy platforms to truly create one very powerful, self-contained web. SpiderSheet is the result of 25 years of Spreadsheet and developer tools knowledge combined into one very powerful and easy to use tool that allows anyone to create an application to solve real world business problems quickly and cheaply. It truly is a better Spreadsheet. The time is now to change the way the world solves business productivity issues. As future versions evolve, we want to open our platform up to importing and connecting any legacy data, so businesses can integrate everything into one easy to use platform. We also have visions of adding Artificial Intelligence to further enhance the productivity and accuracy as we will continue to innovate and be the leader in this new category that we are about to create.
Why is a Spreadsheet the perfect methodology for solving this complex problem? Let’s take a closer look at what a Spreadsheet really is and why it has been the go-to business tool for so long. Let’s start by comparing Spreadsheets to traditional Database-Driven IT Systems. Both are used as Data Storage/Database, Data Modeling, Reporting and UI Operations like Adding, Deleting, Querying and updating records.
Advantages
The user doesn’t need to know how to operate a Database. He only sees it as a bunch of cells he can save to a file. Columns, Tables and Ranges of cells can easily be defined to build the data model to his specifications Cells can very easily be edited to add, delete, change and view the data in a very fast and flexible manner. Once the data is entered, on demand reports can be created and presented
Disadvantages
The data is very unstructured, allowing no relationship between cells within a row or cells in other rows or cells in different sheets. It is very easy to misuse. Data accuracy is not checked or guaranteed make the it very easy to make mistakes and very hard to trace and track down. The ability to use a form to help with data accuracy is not an option. The cell types used within cells is very limited and there is only one view, making it very difficult to show different scenarios with the same data. There is no Access Control. Data permissions simply do not exist, making it impossible to only show data that people have permission to see. There is also no Workflow and Automation. Spreadsheets do not handle automated processing making it impossible to send notifications when specified events occur
Advantages
The data is very structured, meaning that the data is arranged by records and fields Role-Based Access Control is usually very powerful along with complex workflow that is designed for specific needs Forms are usually used for data collection making it faster and less error prone
Disadvantages
Although there are advantages to a form’s driven design, there are also disadvantages. The main disadvantage is that the forms are usually designed by technical people. Also, some people are much more comfortable entering directly into a table. It must be created by a highly technical staff. Designed for a single purpose and cannot be easily changed as the company’s needs change, without incurring further time and money. Customizing requirements and changing functionality requires professional developers with a very high associated cost. Developing a custom solution can takes months or even years with a very high associated cost.
Part Spreadsheet
Create a Spreadsheet-like operational experience which will provide a fast, efficient and flexible and tool that anyone can use, no matter what their skill level is. Similar products provide a non-editable table that is for viewing purposes only. The users want to be able to do everything they can within a spreadsheet, like add, delete and update data directly in the table. They also get very excited when they discover the endless ways to manipulate, format and change the views of the data and even add charts. Excel is the most used business tool in the world with an estimated 750 million users worldwide. It makes sense to leverage these skillsets.
Part Database
Provide a spreadsheet interface by force very structured data that is forced to be in rows and columns just like records and fields in a database. Access Control is mandatory when dealing with sensitive data. An easy way for anyone to add Workflow and Automation is also mandatory for any database driven application.
Meet SpiderSheet
With the ease and flexibility of a spreadsheet design, a truly professional database driven applications can easily be created by anyone with no technical experience. No Code Required. In fact, you don’t even need to know what a database is. Any number of flexible solutions can easily be created and customized to solve any organization’s specific and unique needs like: ERP, CRM, SCM, OA and HR systems. A huge collection of samples and templates can easily be customized to get the users up and running quickly The tables can be changed at any time as business’s needs evolve. If you need to add a new field sometime down the road, no problem, simply add it like you would add a column in a spreadsheet. Simply define your requirements and anyone in your organization can build the solution without professional technicians, greatly reducing time and money.
SpiderSheet allows anyone with no programming experience to build a true business productivity solution. If you can use a spreadsheet, you can use SpiderSheet. Very simple, very flexible and extremely powerful.
Cloud Based Collaborative System
Collaboration is the key to running successful business today. We provide many types of collaboration like the ability to chat in real-time on any given table, while maintaining the history of each chat. We also provide real-time collaborative editing. Any changes that are made by any member of the team are seen automatically by anyone else who is viewing the table at the same time
Table Driven
Data modeling with a familiar Spreadsheet experience makes creating and operating tables very flexible and fast. You can quickly create tables, add columns(fields), add rows, edit directly within the cells, use Selection/Cut/Copy/Paste/Drag fill, and even familiar things like Conditional formatting, sorting and filtering. There are currently 37 flexible and powerful column types, allowing you to format, input and display your data both accurately and creatively. Among the many Column Types is one that allows tables to be linked to other tables, allowing for the creation of a true relational database system without the knowledge of even knowing what a database is.
Forms
Although data can be manipulated solely within the table, we also provide a very powerful and sophisticated forms generator and editor that the users can invoke at any time to edit the row in a form view instead of a table view. SpiderSheet gives you the ability to edit directly in the table or form, whichever you or any of your users are the most comfortable with. Forms can also be published to the web, allowing data input from the outside to become a very simple task. The Form is simply filled out and submitted and the data is conveniently saved within the table.
Views
Give creative and more productive visual views of your data beyond the traditional Grid view making your data truly come to life and become much more readable. SpiderSheet provides different View Types like Kanban, Calendar, Cards, Gantt and Reports. This allows your data to be seen in new ways By using filters, sorting and conditional formatting, different views can be created to target the data that you really want to see or want someone else to see, like maybe you want to create a view that only shows open issues that are due to close in the next week.
Dashboards
Any number of Dashboards can be added to an app. Our easy to use Dashboard designer allows you to build professional Dashboards that can display tables and graphs of your live data. As the data changes, so does the Dashboard. SpiderSheet currently supports 10 Chart Types: Table, Pivot Table, Vertical Bar Chart, Horizontal Bar Chart, Pie Chart, Line Chart, Area Chart, Scatter Chart, Funnel Chart and Gauge Chart. More will be added in future versions.
Rights Management
Have full control over your data and who can see what. Your data is very sensitive, so it is very important that you have the ability to decide who can see and edit what. SpiderSheet has a very sophisticated rolls manager that allows you to create your own roles with your own rules. This way you have full control over who can view or edit any piece of data. Your data is too important to be seen by the wrong eyes.
Automated Workflow
A very powerful workflow system allows you to set up notifications or automatically send emails based on many different scenarios, such as rows added, data changed, thresholds exceeded or any number of conditional situations that may be unique to your specific task.
We want to change the way applications are written in the future. As the market changes we will be right there leading the way with new and innovative feature. Our current plans for future versions include but are not limited to the following: Import and export to many different types of data, allowing legacy data to be shared with SpiderSheet and SpiderSheet data to be shared to other in-house solutions. Use third party products to allow the user to integrate with thousands of apps A full featured Live Document designer so that any document can by attached to a table and populated with specified data from any record Use AI to create an App Builder based around Mind Maps. This is a revolutionary idea that will allow users to build apps very quickly Generate Reports and Dashboards automatically Of course, Native mobile apps are already in production an will be released very soon