Numbers and the Next Big Thing

Paul Kim is disappointed that Numbers isn’t a multidimensional spreadsheet:

One subtle difference between the 2D and multidimensional models is that in the latter, the data model is expected to be dense. What this means [is that] you don’t really have unused cells; all cells are intended to have meaning in your model. It’s not a freeform grid but a packed model of data. For people used to sticking all sorts of random non-computational stuff into spreadsheets, this can be hard to adjust to. Basically, people are using spreadsheets not so much as computational tables but as a big piece of graph paper.

Indeed, sounds interesting. But I think Numbers’s canvas paradigm is going to prove far more popular than this would have.

★ Thursday, 16 August 2007