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It's not just the tools that are used. As Microsoft (and OpenOffice folks) understood in the 90's, it's all about file formats.

On one hand, you have things like CSV which Excel understands but doesn't prefer... easily generatable from a database or flat-file even using comamnd line cut/sed/awk.

On the other hand you have XLS(X) - which a TON of enterprise software generates - because it works better on Excel (lockin!) and supports things CSV doesn't (multi-sheet files, formatting, even pivot tables and such).

To win or even compete in this space you need to support the file formats - Apple's Numbers supports XLSX, but the feature support is minimal and lots of edge-conditions that are not present when using Excel crop up here (as with Libre/OpenOffice).



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