Formula Intent Analysis and Auto-Construction in Spreadsheets
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Solution Overview
Problem
Spreadsheet applications with many features face challenges in discovering new features or behaviors, leading to undiscoverable and hard-to-adopt functionalities, resulting in the continued use of inefficient and deprecated formulas due to complexity and user knowledge gaps.
Innovation Solution
The system automatically constructs new formulas based on the intent of existing formulas, determining intent through various methods such as analyzing neighboring formulas, dependents, and natural language understanding, and validates the new formulas to ensure they produce the same results, providing audit information and user interface support for adoption.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If new features are added to spreadsheet applications, then functionality and efficiency are improved, but user discoverability and adoption become more difficult due to complexity
Solution Approach 1:
The system automatically analyzes existing formulas and generates optimized versions without requiring user knowledge of new features. The application serves itself by detecting formula patterns, determining intent, and proposing improvements, eliminating the need for users to discover or understand complex new functionality.
Solution Approach 2:
The system acts as an intermediary between legacy formulas and new features by automatically translating old formula patterns into new feature usage. It analyzes the intent of existing formulas and generates equivalent expressions using newer, more efficient functions, bridging the gap between old and new capabilities.
2Productivity
If users adopt new formulas, then efficiency is improved, but risk of breaking existing solutions increases due to complexity and knowledge gaps
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary analysis and validation before implementing formula changes. It evaluates existing formulas, determines their intent, generates optimized versions, and validates that the new formulas produce equivalent results, ensuring reliability before adoption.
Solution Approach 2:
The system provides feedback to users about proposed formula changes, showing the original formula, the optimized version, and validation results. This feedback loop allows users to review changes before implementation, maintaining confidence and reducing risk.
3Ease of manufacture
If existing formulas are made more readable and efficient, then maintainability is improved, but compatibility with legacy solutions may be compromised
Solution Approach 1:
The system changes parameters of formulas by transforming them into different functional equivalents that maintain the same behavior. It analyzes formula intent and generates new expressions using updated functions, improving readability while preserving computational equivalence through careful parameter mapping.
Data Source
AI summary
Aspects of the present disclosure relate to systems and methods for automatically constructing a new formula based upon an existing formula. Various methods are employed to analyze an existing formula in order to determine an intent. Once the intent is determined, a new formula may be constructed that satisfies the intent of the existing formula. Further aspects relate to validating the new formula to ensure it produces the same result as the existing formula which it is intended to replace. Various user interface elements are also disclosed which may be employed to provide the newly constructed formulas to users of an application. The various aspects to disclosed herein may be performed by an application, such as a spreadsheet application, performed in real-time, or provided as a remote service.