Linux in Excel(github.com)
186 pointsby radeeyate8 days ago18 comments
  • euroderf8 days ago
    Before long you'll have a different LLM embedded in each of a series of cells, and they'll each have an opinion on what you are doing elsewhere in the sheet, and your One True Trusted Overview LLM (named OTTO) will survey them and take a vote and get back to you.
    • sosborn7 days ago
      Sounds like how things are run at my place of work.
      • cyanydeez6 days ago
        Before long, CEOs will be on Mars and their AI avatars will download daily updates into their excels.
      • CartwheelLinux6 days ago
        My vote for comment thread of the year. Had coffee coming out of my nose with these two
    • sargstuff7 days ago
      sounds like excel cell that calls html link to dynamically 'fetch' what needs to be display in cell. Link results can be the result(s) of almost anything. OTTO could well be a redirected link by server to 'sub-server' machine.
  • dmitrygr8 days ago
    “ The emulator is built as a seperate dll which is loaded by the VBA macro. The VBA macro calls the emulator in the dll and gets the output and writes it into the cells in the spreadsheet. ”

    Not really in excel. Excel is just the console. Emulator is a native DLL

    • qwertox7 days ago
      I was expecting something like the cells being used as registers and the computer being implemented in the spreadsheet itself. Loading an emulator via a DLL and using the spreadsheet as a line oriented display feels like cheating.
    • yesco7 days ago
      I still think this is pretty neat even if it's just acting like the console.
    • jayd168 days ago
      Excshell
    • zipping15498 days ago
      Still funny
      • AshamedCaptain7 days ago
        By the same logic I can also put a crappy emulator in a dll and make notepad load it via a hook. Linux on notepad.exe. should I make that into a HN post too?

        Now that I mention it, I think someone already posted that on HN...

  • nogajun8 days ago
    Linux can run on Excel, but not Excel on Linux.
    • smodo7 days ago
      Excel is not even Excel anymore. It’s different on Windows, Mac, web, mobile… And there’s different bugs across all them! My favorite ones have to do with regional defaults.
    • grishka8 days ago
      Excel, at least old versions, does run on Linux using Wine.
      • Aardwolf7 days ago
        Then it may be possible to run Excel on Linux in Excel
        • redbell7 days ago
          > run Excel on Linux in Excel

          This remind me of the top comment on Puter's post (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33838179):

          "I am the author of the 'app' called Puter which loads up Puter inside Puter, which then loads up the Puter app again, which ..."

        • xattt7 days ago
          I’d like to see bare-metal Excel.
          • grishka7 days ago
            I was going to say that first versions were technically that, but apparently Excel was never released for DOS, Excel 2.0 was already a Windows application, and 1.0 was only available on Mac.
    • 7 days ago
      undefined
    • timcavel7 days ago
      [dead]
  • tinktank8 days ago
    This is the insanity that I miss.
    • 657 days ago
      I think the guy who made Doom in only Typescript types is a testament to the fact people are still doing insane things with their computers.
    • unixhero7 days ago
      How can you miss it, when it is right here
    • bagatelle7 days ago
      I don't know that I miss it, it's still around if you look for it. Even here, I find several posts a month doing something this insane and fun, let alone finding out about my friends' personal projects.
    • sargstuff7 days ago
      Preference for NP over P?
  • h4ck_th3_pl4n3t7 days ago
    So when will there nmap be backported to run in this VM?

    Would be awesome to have a little VM that can scan for lateral movement possibilities, in an excel spreadsheet. Next-gen malware!

  • valorzard8 days ago
    Would this same trick work on LibreOffice Calc?
    • shakna8 days ago
      Probably not. It calls out to a DLL library for most of the work. One that, unfortunately, is 32bit.

      Libre Calc can load 64bit Excel plugins, but not 32bit (at the moment).

      • 7 days ago
        undefined
  • necovek8 days ago
    It runs on neither MacOS nor Excel cloud though, as it depends on a Windows DLL.
    • yjftsjthsd-h8 days ago
      Wouldn't help with cloud of course, but there's WINE for macOS, isn't there? Or does that version of Excel not allow loading binary libraries such that you could hand it a DLL if WINE translated it?
    • pjmlp8 days ago
      Microsoft 365 is the reason why the new add-in model is focused on Web technologies, and mostly deprecated going forward for new forward.
      • p_ing7 days ago
        It's focused on web tech as COM add-ins are a huge source of security and instability in Office apps. It's also more flexible for developers as they can modify the backend without having to update the client and the deployment model is significantly easier for admins.
        • pjmlp7 days ago
          The .NET ones are also going away.

          Regarding COM, it wouldn't be that bad when using COM Servers.

          However I do agree that although COM as idea is enticing, Microsoft keeps failing to deliver a productive way to use it, despite how much they keep focusing on it for Windows extensibility and API delivery since Vista.

          • Vilian7 days ago
            they don't care more about API the same way the cared in Vista days https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2004/06/13/how-microsoft-lost...
            • pjmlp7 days ago
              Indeed, nowadays I feel myself a fool for having advocated for WinRT, it was one of the reasons why I returned back to Web and distributed systems, after spending four years back in Windows GUI development land.

              And my advice now is for .NET devs, stay with Windows Forms or WPF, depending on which approach they favour.

              For C++, I suggest the aging MFC if it has to be on the Visual Studio (still better out of the box experience than WinUI 3.0 for C++, and C++/WinRT is in maintenance anyway), but really Qt or C++ Builder are much better option.

      • jeroenhd8 days ago
        On the other hand, if you can get it to work in the new O365 architecture using whatever JS API they're exposing now, you can call it "cloud-based" or maybe even "serverless".
    • nxobject8 days ago
      mini-rv32ima is incredibly compact -- I imagine a translation to VBA might not be too hard.
  • padde8 days ago
    Any practical use cases come to mind? Could you actually interact from Excel cells with Linux userspace, e.g. running a cell's value through a bash script as if applying a formula?
  • ivolimmen7 days ago
    Question remains: can you run Windows in LibreOffice under Linux?
    • zombot7 days ago
      I was about to say, "If it can run Doom...", but actually the deamons in Windows are worse and even more hellish than those in Doom.
    • sargstuff7 days ago
      what's 'run'?? same box or link to cloud instance ?
  • nailer8 days ago
    I just posted the ‘doom on a lightning adapter’ story, and saw this in submissions. I’ll have to tip my hat to the better bizarre ‘X on Y’ post. You win this time, radeeyate.
    • dheatov7 days ago
      I support you to one up them with `Lightning adapter on Excel`
  • userbinator8 days ago
    Unfortunately it doesn't seem possible to run WINE in it, and thus another Excel inside that.
  • ngcazz8 days ago
    I thought for a second this would be about the use of a spreadsheet as a general computation device.
  • goodboyjojo7 days ago
    linux and the hit game doom are the things hackers always put on something first. any eletronic
  • aussieguy12348 days ago
    Excel > Linux > Wine > Excel...to infinity?
  • tolien8 days ago
    Next step is to get Doom working on it :-)
  • snvzz7 days ago
    RISC-V is inevitable.
  • apexalpha7 days ago
    Wow! We are in awe that you managed to run Linux on a database tool designed to query Bigdata tables sharded over 72 sheets.

    Very impressive.

    Greetings,

    Deloitte.

    • unixhero7 days ago
      Now lets sing a consulting song
  • furrydoge7 days ago
    [flagged]