Is Coda the spreadsheet of the future?

jeremie levray

Published in

Growth Marketing Matters

4 min readJun 13, 2018

Coda is a next generation spreadsheet tool to collaborate with your team and to work more efficiently.

Why not using Excel, like everybody?

I do use Excel, but I think we should always be testing new solutions to find what fits the best for us.

What is different in Coda?

In Coda documents, rows and columns are named objects, making formulas both easier to read and write.

Your formulas no longer have to refer to “A2: G8” 😉

Instead you simply write the name of the column.

This is not an Excel replacement at all, Excel is still an extremely powerful tool.

Excel and other classic spreadsheet software also required formulas to be placed inside of tables.

In Coda they can be placed anywhere.

For example, if you have a Table in your document, and hit “=” somewhere else, you can pull in data from that table.

We tried to use it at TheGrowthConcierge, and we found it interesting for the interface and simplicity of use.

However, even today, Excel is mainstream and represent a large part of the market.

A Killer strategy 🔫

what would documents and spreadsheets look if they were invented today?

→ That’s where Coda enter in the game

After several years of development, coda announces a private beta version, for free to test.

I will present you a new template that you can use for project management.

TUTO:

I will teach you how to create a brand new Gant table that updates automatically

(see below).

1° First, you need to insert the first table.

(“+” → “Table” → “New Table” )

Name it “Project database.”

It should look like this — see below. (with the right column format)

2° Then, insert a filter to your first table. Click filter, then paste this formula:

=thisrow.created()Now()

Filter to always keep the first table empty

This filter will allow you always to keep your first table empty and clean.

3° Insert another table, but instead of creating a new one, click “insert view of” the first table you created first.

It will be a Gant table, select the right format.

Do not forget to set up the start date and the end date before going further.

Rename it “GANT — Project view”

As soon as you fill in one table, the Gant will automatically fill in (because all the tables are linked)

4° Do not forget to remove the filters in Table 2 and 3 (if linked to the first table).

5° Insert the third table using the same process (Do not select Gant but Table).

Remove the filters and enjoy.

You can change lines format using “H1 H2 H3 “ for more visibility.

Project duration: H1
Parts: H2
Tasks: H3
Undertasks= regular text

Then you can separate the different parts of your project

When you change data in any table of this doc, the other tables linked will update automatically.

Then you can for example, extend the length of one task directly from the Gant, of from the “Project Database” table.

Reddit quotes:

I have selected some quotes from people talking about coda found on social media (Reddit, Quora).

“Coda is based on the way we interact with the Web and Web apps. It mixes pictures graphs, text, comments, it’s built to be collaborative, live updated, uses external APIs to interact with other web services.”

“It might have a bright future, I would certainly be interested in it for keeping live documentation on software development, but it is definitely not a spreadsheet software.”

“Basically a sheet is a blank canvas on which you can drop tables or charts or other things.”

Other alternatives?

There are many projects aimed at making Excel “a thing of the past” but they focus on different needs, here are some examples:

o https://airtable.com — use tables for data organization and organize anything