Hey, I tried to send you something through Intercom on the site, but something was broken and it wouldn't send. Here's what I tried to write:
Cool idea. Found this from a @worrydream tweet. Some comments after playing with it for a few minutes:
* A bit disappointing that I can only have uniform or Gaussian distributions. At minimum I'd like a binary distribution (coin flip, probably biased coin flip). A lot of things I would want to model need this (e.g., will we close this sale? will we close this investor? that kind of thing.)
* I'm really confused by the arbitrary two-letter codes assigned to things for formulas. Makes the formulas impossible to read. Why not just use the names I give to the cells, or something derived from the names?
Really nice start though! I'm co-founder & CEO of fieldbook.com, another spreadsheet-like tool, so I love information tools and anything that expands the mind's capacity. Best of luck and let me know how I can help!
I just looked at Fieldbook. The user-interface work you've done is fantastic. I'll save you from shamelessness. Here's a link to the promotional video for anyone who's interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qw5f6Qptufc
Give me beta access! I want to play with this thing.
Sorry to hear about Intercom, will investigate shortly. I heard someone else had a similar issue.
In response to your points:
- Other distribution types are the #1 most requested feature at this time. Binary distributions are possible using functions instead of the built in distributions, though obviously not intuitive. It's built using math.js, which has several random functions of different kinds. (In this case, you could use '=randomInt(0,1)' to produce a coin flip.
- The arbitrary two-letter codes were simply the easiest thing to begin with. I started with something derived from the names, but this presented problems with cells with empty names, especially ones that started empty and later become non-empty. Excel has a pretty sophisticated model for referencing cells. For the sake of getting something shipped, I started with a very simple one. Definitely an area to improve.
- I'd love to talk sometime. I'm also in SF, will send you an email. Thanks for the advice!
Cool, thanks! Yeah, it was not obvious you could create new distribution types with random functions. I didn't look at functions too closely because I didn't expect distributions to be there. Makes sense, though, thanks!
Re the two-letter codes, I totally get doing the simple thing just to launch and get it out there. We face a similar problem in Fieldbook, by the way. Would be happy to explain how our solution works sometime.
Cool idea. Found this from a @worrydream tweet. Some comments after playing with it for a few minutes:
* A bit disappointing that I can only have uniform or Gaussian distributions. At minimum I'd like a binary distribution (coin flip, probably biased coin flip). A lot of things I would want to model need this (e.g., will we close this sale? will we close this investor? that kind of thing.)
* I'm really confused by the arbitrary two-letter codes assigned to things for formulas. Makes the formulas impossible to read. Why not just use the names I give to the cells, or something derived from the names?
Really nice start though! I'm co-founder & CEO of fieldbook.com, another spreadsheet-like tool, so I love information tools and anything that expands the mind's capacity. Best of luck and let me know how I can help!