120 - Advancing Excel as a programming language with Andy Gordon and Simon Peyton Jones

In this episode, Senior Principal Research Manager Andy Gordon and Senior Principal Researcher Simon Peyton Jones share their insights on how Microsoft Excel has evolved as a programming language. While Excel is commonly used by people around the world to make sense of their data, few realize that they’re programming when they use Excel formulas. Through this conversation, Andy and Simon offer a deep dive into Excel’s programming journey, including the evolution of data types and the release of the LAMBDA function, which has transformed the formula language into a Turing-complete programming language. They also discuss the impact of research on Excel’s development and programming as a human-computer interaction challenge, and explore how Excel can empower budding programmers and facilitate decision-making through probabilistic reasoning. Listen in to learn more about how Excel is advancing as a programming language and its potential for the future.

Link to the episode: https://open.spotify.com/episode/3ZmLNtHGijx1rlvt9EvnHl