This section early on in the linked VisiCalc manual was actually helpful to me:<p>> The VisiCalc program was born out of the observation that many problems are commonly solved with a calculator, a pencil, and a sheet of paper — three nearly universal tools. Calculating sales projections, income taxes, financial ratios, your personal budget, engineering changes, cost estimates, and balancing your checkbook are done with these tools.<p>I've never thought of the spreadsheet as the computer equivalent of paper, pencil, and calculator.<p>That might sound odd, but coming from a programming background, I've always viewed it as some sort of limited-database-with-limited-scripting-abilities. I've even felt bad about using spreadsheets sloppily – not structuring data properly, applying formulae systematically, etc.<p>But "electronic paper, pencil, and calculator" does explain exactly how I often end up using spreadsheets, and now I know I shouldn't feel bad about it anymore!
When I first got my very first Palm Pilot I recognised one thing: what the minimum computer needed would be and how much that little gadget could do that, otherwise, would tie me to my desk (or force me to carry my laptop.<p>In the end, most of the time, our day to day needs can be covered by very simple software - text editors, spreadsheets, messaging (including email), threaded discussions, and not that much else.
Somewhat random, but spreadsheets continued to evolve after VisiCalc (obviously).<p>Here is one by the inventor of VisiCalc, Dan Bricklin, on github: <a href="https://github.com/DanBricklin/socialcalc">https://github.com/DanBricklin/socialcalc</a><p>Audrey Tang (who happens to currently serve as the Minister of Digital Affairs of the Republic of China (Taiwan)) created the Node.js port of SocialCalc, EtherCalc: <a href="https://github.com/audreyt/ethercalc">https://github.com/audreyt/ethercalc</a><p>Audrey made a fascinating write up of SocialCalc for The Architecture of Open Source Applications <a href="https://aosabook.org/en/v1/socialcalc.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://aosabook.org/en/v1/socialcalc.html</a>
I worked on something similar and I am so happy to see someone take it to the next level :)<p><a href="https://twitter.com/radiofreejohn/status/780664363631935488" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://twitter.com/radiofreejohn/status/780664363631935488</a><p>and<p><a href="https://twitter.com/radiofreejohn/status/784050276198080513" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://twitter.com/radiofreejohn/status/784050276198080513</a>
Slightly OT:<p>For those who have used TIC-80 or PICO-8 to introduce their young (e.g 7yo) kid to programming by modifying games, what games did you start with? And any other tips?
I wish the community focused on an open source platform like TIC-80[0].<p>0. <a href="https://tic80.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://tic80.com/</a>