The use of Charts, Pivot Tables, and Array Formulas in two Popular Spreadsheet Corpora

TL;DR

This paper analyzes the usage patterns of charts, pivot tables, and array formulas in two major spreadsheet corpora to understand their role in decision support and error-proneness.

Contribution

It provides the first comprehensive analysis of non-formula spreadsheet features in popular corpora, expanding understanding of spreadsheet usage beyond formulas.

Findings

Charts and pivot tables are frequently used for decision support.

Array formulas are less common but significant in complex calculations.

Understanding these features can help improve spreadsheet reliability.

Abstract

The use of spreadsheets in industry is widespread. Companies base decisions on information coming from spreadsheets. Unfortunately, spreadsheets are error-prone and this increases the risk that companies base their decisions on inaccurate information, which can lead to incorrect decisions and loss of money. In general, spreadsheet research is aimed to reduce the error-proneness of spreadsheets. Most research is concentrated on the use of formulas. However, there are other constructions in spreadsheets, like charts, pivot tables, and array formulas, that are also used to present decision support information to the user. There is almost no research about how these constructions are used. To improve spreadsheet quality it is important to understand how spreadsheets are used and to obtain a complete understanding, the use of charts, pivot tables, and array formulas should be included in research. In this paper, we analyze two popular spreadsheet corpora: Enron and EUSES on the use of the aforementioned constructions.