Easy Data Transform

Posted by Prion
Jul 27, 2021 at 10:03 AM

A short account of my experience with EasyDataTranform (EDT), which I know is not outliner-related but may still be of interest to some in our circle

https://www.easydatatransform.com

EasyDataTransform is a program that facilitates morphing data that can be represented as a spreadsheet into a different shape. I bought it some time ago thinking it might come in useful some day which promptly did. Only then I realised that it was not a vaguely more powerful version of find-and-replace or some data transformation one can do in Excel but a whole new level. I usually do data transformations one step after the other and more often than I care to admit something messes up and suddenly I realise that a name is now associated with a different address or something like that meaning that makes me lose faith in my data. Even though all different versions may still be around (at least some of them) it is usually so tedious to find what when wrong at which step that it is usually faster to just start over from scratch.

This is precisely where EDT (for lack of a better word) excels. You get a nice flow chart of steps you followed each with a live representation of how the spreadsheet looked after each one of them. You can even branch off and follow a different trajectory to see if a different strategy works better to achieve the same end result.
You can watch an excel file and treat your EDT file as a pipeline that now processes the changed input.
Everything can be saved as a *.transform file that someone else can open who can click through each of your steps and see what you did, which parameters can be used (which can be changed live).

I learned this through two friendly and informative emails with such files attached that I received from the developer Andy Brice of Hyperplan fame, who is also active on this forum. EDT is way more powerful than it may seem at first sight.
I so wished that something as powerful as EDT had been around when I wrote my PhD.

Prion

PS: As it happens, I got an email that Bitsdujour has EDT for 50% off today. If I did not have a license already that would be an instabuy. BTW I am not affiliated with the developer in any way

https://www.bitsdujour.com/software/easy-data-transform/in=todays-deals-home