Squirrel365 v1.18 has been a while in the making! It has been driven by our desire to keep feature parity between the client tool/desktop designer experience and the new browser based designer experience that we are about to roll out. It’s full of exciting new features designed to streamline your app building workflow.

Expanding cloud platform capabilities

Versions and Autosave

2024 in a nutshell

What an incredible year 2024 has been, so there’s no better time to do our first year in review!

Together, we’ve made remarkable progress in both our product and community. These achievements wouldn’t have been possible without the unwavering support of our amazing customers and community.

Thank you for choosing to build with Squirrel365. Your feedback and collaboration with our product and engineering teams have been invaluable, driving continuous improvement and innovation.

We’re excited to share our successes with you—from groundbreaking new integrations to the growth of our community and learning resources. Here’s to another year of innovation and collaboration!

Word is getting out

The number of people building apps with Squirrel grew by over 30% in 2024

An incredible 8,714 new apps were published

And published content got over 18 million views. That’s an app, created using Squirrel365, being viewed somewhere in the world every 1.75 seconds

Engaging our community

Throughout the year, the Squirrel365 team hosted webinars and posted articles and blogs sharing product updates, use case insights, and how-to’s with our growing community.

The Squirrel365 team use the platform to keep you informed of product updates and news, hints and tips etc. But far more importantly over 63% of the content in 2024 was generated by people like you. The number of members in our online community has grown by 53% in 2024, meaning a much bigger pool of like-minded Squirrel enthusiasts sharing their knowledge and experiences.

If you haven’t joined the community yet, what are you waiting for? Visit the community and log in with your Squirrel365 credentials.

Game changing features

We introduced a tonne of new features in our Winter and Summer releases as we continue to make app building accessible to more than just developers.

Automate PDF and PPTX document generation

In 2024 a primary use case emerged. You told us you were using Squirrel365 to build value calculators. With Squirrel365’s spreadsheet logic engine, it’s the perfect fit for bespoke/custom calculators using what-if style analysis interactive inputs and outputs. We created the PDF/PPTX generator to turn those ROI and pricing calculators into invaluable tools that can automate the creation of PDF documents, PowerPoint slides or Excel Workbooks. Think auto creation of business cases or quotations tailored to the user/prospect/customer.

OAuth for google sheets and Excel Online

A key milestone in democratising app creation is providing the ability to securely source data from online sources that we all have access to. By adding authenticated connectivity to Google Sheets and Excel, we made it possible to browse Google Drive, or One Drive to select a spreadsheet to be used as a live data source for your app.

Not only that but because we’re talking directly to the Google Sheet or Excel document, we can now update and insert rows too! Turn your project into an application with write-back capabilities, no database needed!

Progressive Web Applications (PWA)

PWA’s have been around for a while. Last year saw an increase in their popularity mainly due to app developers growing tired of the high percentages taken when selling apps via app stores. PWA’s allow you to visit a website or web app and install it as application on your device. This felt like a natural fit for Squirrel365 apps so we added this as an option for subscribers to the Builder plan. Customise your app with a name and an icon and you have something that looks and feels like a native app on mobile devices.

Custom code and more

Throughout 2024 we saw an increased demand for complex/highly customised apps. We often solved challenges with custom code to get an app to look a certain way, or do more than is available with standard components. What started as a quick fix for some of our consulting projects made it into the core product to allow the use of use Custom CSS and Javascript.

We also added support for Google Tag Manager so that you can add even more custom code (via tags) to your apps. Need to track conversions, get enhanced analytics, add cookie compliance? Our GTM feature, allows you to do just that!

Where we went…

IBIS

2024 saw the second ever customer influence session conducted at the IBIS Conference. It provided an opportunity to reflect on the features and enhancements that were directly influenced by regular Squirrel users. By the end of 2024 we had managed to deliver 12 out of the 17 top voted enhancements. As always talking to customers proved invaluable and revealed insights that we simply cannot get from data and product analytics alone.

Company catch-ups at The Wave, Bristol

As a 100% remote company it’s nice when we come together.

This year we started meeting at The Wave for company catch ups and workshops. It’s an inland surfing lake that has meeting rooms to hire and a cool café to work from. More recently, we extended this to ‘work together Fridays’. It’s completely optional and gives people a chance to just turn up and work with others. We’ve even had a few customers join us. If you are ever in the Bristol area just let us know as it’s great to work, chat and innovate together over a coffee.

Looking ahead to 2025

A lot of work has happened already, in preparation for our next release. This will include a soft launch of our designer in the browser experience, making it easier for people to get started without having to install anything. For those of us that prefer to use a client tool, the current desktop designer isn’t going anywhere. It’s essentially the same code base so we can ensure feature parity (as much as possible) between the two experiences.

Some of the other cool features to look forward to:

• Image library
• Autosave (cloud saved files and versioning
• Layout containers to support responsive design
• Custom fonts
• And we’ve turned a few of our add-on functions into native functions, making them part of the core product, and improving the experience.

To everyone who has been part of our journey so far — customers, partners, and team members – Congratulations on all the achievements of 2024. We can’t wait to work together to make an even more remarkable 2025.

Learn what’s new in version 1.17 of Squirrel365.

The sessions

1. Building ROI Calculators in Squirrel that are Changing the Force in Sales by Ziv Barzilay.

Final thoughts

What is IBIS 2023?

A few weeks ago the Squirrel365 team attended IBIS 2023 an education and knowledge exchange event dedicated to BusinessObjects. Why were we there with Squirrel365? Well, as you may or may not know, Squirrel was born out of a connection to the BusinessObjects world.

As long-time users of the SAP BusinessObjects suite we, like others, were mortified that one of the products in the SAP BO stable was going away. The death of Flash sealed the fate of Xcelsius (also known as SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards) and it left a huge gap in the market.

Hello Squirrel!

So, after 6 months of research, and a year of development, we had a product that gave people a way to move forward. It became possible to migrate existing Xcelsius content over and create new dashboards and what-if calculators in a way that was familiar with little to no learning curve. Allowing users to leverage the already considerable investment they had spent both in terms of time and training.

Modern-day Squirrel is about no-code app development, rapid prototyping and creating interactive web calculators.

Squirrel365 has evolved a LOT since those early days. The migration wizard is a thing of the past and dashboarding is no longer the primary use case. Modern-day Squirrel is about no-code app development, rapid prototyping and creating interactive web calculators. However, the relationship with SAP BusinessObjects remains strong. Squirrel365’s connectors and webi extension capability allow you to bring web intelligence data into your Squirrel projects and Squirrel projects into your web intelligence reports. So it makes sense to attend and present at IBIS where the community of BO users can ask questions and learn about the existence of Squirrel as a tool to enhance and augment their current BI technology stack.

Fascinating case studies…

It’s always encouraging to see what people are doing with the product. Some of the great case studies we attended this year included…

400 spreadsheets replaced by one app.

We learned how Tenet Health replaced 400+ individual spreadsheets that were used to track cashflow at surgery centres and hospitals with a single web app created using Squirrel365.

Communicating the impact of changing critical input assumptions.

A leading consultancy in the renewable energy space is using Squirrel365 to create calculator apps that allow key stakeholders to view critical metrics and experiment with the impacts of changing critical input assumptions.

Reducing freight costs saving over $500,000 a year.

One of the biggest challenges with any BI solution is user adoption. A major paper wholesaler had freight saving opportunities identified in a 50 page report that no one was reading. Using Squirrel365 they replaced this report with an engaging interactive solution that resulted in savings of over $500,000 per year.

The Squirrel team presented on several subjects during their sessions. The new PPTX Parser, PDF Monkey add-on and PWA capabilities were a big hit! More on these soon 🙂

Meeting people

Ultimately, attending a conference like IBIS is all about human connections. We spoke to people that were completely new to Squirrel. Others who have been watching as Squirrel matures and with its new focus on app building can see areas where they can use Squirrel alongside their existing tools.

Finally, I have to mention the Squirrel Hackathon 2023. For the second year running attendees were invited to take part in the hackathon. You can read about last year’s Squirrel hackathon 2022. Participants are given a spreadsheet, a little bit of context and a Squirrel365 account and told to go forth and build an app or dashboard. With a couple of prizes up for grabs. See what our hackathon participants created in our blog post.

It can be tough working on Squirrel day in and day out and not seeing any of the fruits of your labour. But being present at an event like IBIS lets us see some of the fantastic stuff people are making with our product. We’re looking forward to next year already!

Taking Squirrel to Big Data LDN

Earlier this year Squirrel365 exhibited at Big Data LDN (London) It’s the UK’s leading free-to-attend data & analytics conference and exhibition. We were there to show off Squirrel and InfoBurst and how, together, they make a great addition to your BI stack. 

Along with the usual demos, it presented the perfect opportunity to show off an app created with Squirrel — a free lead capture app.  The app allowed us to gather basic contact information from interested attendees quickly. Which led to some great discussions about the creation process.

The motives behind building this lead capture app were partly to save money but, more importantly, to show attendees what Squirrel is capable of. 

Planning the lead capture app

We decided only first name, last name, and email address was essential. Once submitted this would be written to an external Google Sheet. Attendees should enter their information but must not see anyone else’s. Only those with the password should be able to access the list of leads. And clicking on the name should allow you to update information and add any notes if needed.

Finally, an analytics page would keep track of how many leads had been captured. Detailing what they were interested in (Squirrel, InfoBurst, or both) and their level of interest. This would help us identify “Hot Leads”.

Designing the App

Our UX/UI team designed the user flow and visuals for the lead capture app. Ensuring a consistent look and feel to the app and making sure it was easy to use. This involved considering the right components to display and capture information, navigation, themes and colours. With the UX and visual design done, all that remained was to build it.

Building the app

Using Squirrel’s intuitive interface, I was able to bring the application together quickly – matching the design specifications closely. The build itself took a couple of days to complete. When it came to wiring up the components to the spreadsheet there was a lot more that needed doing. The components had to insert the data into the correct place. I also had to check that the spreadsheet formulas were calculating correctly and that any functions I had in place – like the Data Mover – triggered correctly.

“It all came down to my knowledge of Excel formulas and the functionality of Squirrel’s components, and it just goes to show that anything is possible… when you know how!”

Challenges!

The biggest challenge, personally, was the creation of the “Password Protect” screen, which would secure two pages. This should appear when either the list or analytics sections are accessed. The difficult bit was getting it to stay hidden after the password was successfully entered. I wanted to prevent someone from having to enter the passcode again when switching between those two pages. After a bit of trial and error, I had it cracked! It all came down to my knowledge of Excel formulas and the functionality of Squirrel’s components, and it just goes to show that anything is possible… when you know how!

Subsequently, we created a demo version of the ‘secure’ area. Enabling us to show interested attendees how it would function without exposing real data.

Try it out

I am continually amazed at what you can create with Squirrel365.

Try out the free lead capture app below. Or sign up and have a go at building an app of your own.

Psst… the password is 1234

On the 14th of July, we held the inaugural Squirrel365 Experience. A virtual event with over 3 hrs of content exclusively for the Squirrel365 community. This online experience covered a wide range of topics, I’ve summarised a few of them below.

A squirrel project makeover

The idea for this session was to take a real-world example of a standard, vanilla-looking project and bring it to life.
We went inside the mind of a Squirrel designer and found out what they think about when it comes to making a user interface stand out. We learned that you don’t need to be a designer. By following the design basics, you can apply a set of rules to improve your project. And with a few simple techniques in Squirrel, this is easy.

Doing more with the Zapier Connector for Squirrel365

Mitch Lewis from Evaluator Group blew the audience away with his innovative use of Squirrels Zapier connector. Mitch showed how he connects Squirrel to Zapier, adding another dimension to their interactive quotation tool. Evaluator Groups customers can use the tool to generate a quote and have it emailed to them (as a PDF). The details are then saved in Hubspot so they can see who has been interacting with the tool and follow up on any leads.
It’s an innovative example of how Zapiers 4000+ integrations can extend the capabilities of Squirrel.

Top tips with Donald MacCormick

For anyone who thinks they know Squirrel, this session had us thinking again. Diving into some of the lesser known Squirrel features (and time-saving tips and tricks), Donald demonstrated tip after tip for getting the most out of Squirrel. The buzz in the ‘virtual room’ was palpable as everybody learned something. Some of the great tips included:

• Keyboard shortcuts for whizzing around the spreadsheet
• Turning off real-time updates for better performance
• Clicking on the cell binding tooltip to jump to the cell/range in the spreadsheet
• Getting to the start screen by clicking the Squirrel icon in the top left of the designer
• Setting publishing settings on the project in the canvas properties.

A resounding success

For me personally, there were so many highlights. But, without a doubt, the biggest was seeing how passionate the Squirrel365 community are to learn and share their knowledge.

After such a successful first event, the Squirrel team are already thinking about the next Squirrel365 Experience. In the meantime, we have created the Squirrel365 Marketplace for add-ons. Soon we will be adding templates and resources. The marketplace provides a space to contribute to the Squirrel365 community by creating and publishing add-ons, templates and other resources.

An AI Bot to write Excel formulas ???

Over the weekend I received the weekly newsletter from the chaps at Full Stack Modeller (it’s a quick and quirky read for anyone in the spreadsheet/modelling world, written alternately by Giles Male and Kenny Whitelaw-Jones, I thoroughly recommend it).

In this issue there was a short section about “Excel formula bot”, a free, AI-powered bot written by David Bressler that turns a plain English description into an appropriate Excel formula.

Kenny’s example was: “remove the last four characters from any text label” which returned him the formula =LEFT(A1,LEN(A1)-4)

Must be a lucky hit I thought. How wrong I was!

This bot is a truly remarkable (and slightly scary) piece of technology as you can see from my experiments below.

Experiments with the Excel Formula Bot

First I just checked a variant of Kenny’s example by asking “get the text between the dot and the comma in another piece of text” to which the reply was:

=LEFT(RIGHT(A1,FIND(“,”,A1)-FIND(“.”,A1)),FIND(“,”,A1)-FIND(“.”,A1))

which is correct but perhaps a little long winded, however a slight change in the request gives a better answer:

Input: get what is between the dot and the comma in a piece of text

Output: =MID(A1,FIND(“.”,A1)+1,FIND(“,”,A1)-FIND(“.”,A1)-1)

Then I remembered a post I had commented on last week about getting the smallest non-zero value in a range, so I typed “return the smallest non-zero value in a range” and got

=MIN(IF(A1:A10>0,A1:A10))

Which was at least as good as all the suggestions which had been made in the post.

Now I was hooked. I launched one of my favourites; “return the annual growth rate from two 5 year values”, to my surprise, it got this right too replying:

=((B2/A2)^(1/5))-1

extraordinary! It gets even more useful if you ask the general question “return the annual growth rate from two values” which gives:

= ((Ending Value/Beginning Value)^(1/Number of years))-1

So then I thought, “what about Squirrel365 specific ones?”, for example in Squirrel it is often useful to be able to toggle a value in a cell, and sure enough:

Input: toggle a value

Output: =IF(A1=1,0,1)

What about VLOOKUP?

Finally I went to the old stalwart which everyone knows but can never remember; VLOOKUP:

Input: the value in the third column of a B1:F17 matching A1 in the first column

Output: =VLOOKUP(A1,B1:F17,3,FALSE)

But some people prefer INDEX and MATCH so I added “using index and match” to my request and sure enough I got:

Input: the value in the third column of a B1:F17 matching A1 in the first column using index and match

Output: =INDEX(B1:F17,MATCH(A1,B1:B17,0),3)

But what about XLOOKUP? The same is true, changing to “using XLOOKUP” gave:

Input: the value in the third column of a B1:F17 where the first column of B1:F17 matches A1 xlookup

Output: =XLOOKUP(A1,B1:F17,3)

Failing on Primes

In the short time I played with it, the only thing I could find to break it was to ask it about prime numbers:

Input: return the tenth prime number

Output: =PRIMENUMBER(10)

Input: is 2343 prime

Output: =ISPRIME(2343)

Which looked good until I realised that neither of these functions exist in Excel (or Google Sheets). Perhaps this is just the bot predicting a future release!

An AI Bot for a Complete Excel Profitability Model?

Primes notwithstanding, I was truly staggered (and as I said slightly scared) at what the bot could do.

How long before I could ask for “a model to predict 15 year profitability of our network in the face of the acquisition of one of our large customers by a competitor” and get a model with all appropriate drivers in it returned in a few seconds. Before seeing the Excel Formula Bot I would have been very sceptical, now I am not so sure. Perhaps AI is coming after our financial modelling jobs after all.

If you want to try it out and amaze/scare yourself, then you can find the bot at:

https://excelformulabot.com/

What is IBIS?

Last week some of the Squirrel team attended the Infosol IBIS event in Arizona. IBIS is the leading independent BusinessObjects education and knowledge event.  We were there both to hear how people are using Squirrel and to update them with all our latest product news.

Many BusinessObjects customers use Squirrel as a replacement for the missing dashboarding in the BOBJ BI Platform. Others use Squirrel stand alone or with direct access to their databases through the InfoSol InfoBurst product.

IBIS, it is a great opportunity to see BI organisations showcase their work, impart their knowledge, and share their experiences. With many talks to choose from each day, there was never a dull moment and always an opportunity to learn new things.

Squirrel Case Studies at InfoSol IBIS

There were many fascinating case studies, including:

• USPI – improving Healthcare Operations using BusinessObjects and Squirrel365
• Hain Celestial – Improved Processing and Visibility to Warehouse Shipments Using BusinessObjects and Squirrel365

These IBIS sessions were notable for their operational nature. Usually dashboards stop at providing data on historic trends but these were different. They also provide near-real time information to drive operational decision-making in the USPI medical facilities and Hain’s warehouses.

In fact, these dashboards were great examples of “BI Dashboard Apps” as discussed by Squirrel’s own Donald MacCormick in his keynote “BI Dashboard Apps – The next big thing in BI”.

In terms of standalone Squirrel dashboards, the standout examples were from Bill Straus, CEO of Future Metrics. BIll presented twice during the conference:

• How Dashboards are Helping International Trade in Renewable Fuel that Replaces Coal in Power Generation
• How Dashboards are Helping Replace Hydrocarbons with Carbohydrates in the Power Generation Sector

These fascinating sessions explained how Future Metrics is helping reduce our collective carbon footprint by championing a move from coal to sustainable wood pellets. Included in the presentation is some of their suite of 15 Squirrel dashboard calculators (all built “no code” from spreadsheets). They use these on their website to share and communicate their industry expertise (you can see all their dashboards at https://www.futuremetrics.info/).

Hackathon

Continuing the environmental theme, InfoSol IBIS featured a Squirrel hackathon. Here attendees were invited to build a Squirrel project based on a spreadsheet to calculate personal carbon footprints.

Neither of the two winners had used Squirrel before the conference but both quickly took to the tool and produced great looking interactive carbon footprint calculators. The younger winner (who was only 13) left the conference with a plan to hold a similar hackathon for her fellow pupils back at school.

On a lighter note, David Behr from USPI presented a session on:

• Building an online jewellery store mobile application for my 11-year-old daughter with Squirrel365

Which featured a Squirrel app he created which his daughter uses to sell bracelets she makes online. (Even school children have a side hustle these days)

Astronomy at InfoSol IBIS

However, for many of us, the highlight of the Infosol IBIS was an evening of star gazing. Mark Johnston aka AZAstroGuy (https://www.azastroguy.com/) brought along his telescope and his vast  knowledge of all things extra-terrestrial and treated us to two hours of wonder. We saw everything from binary star systems to whirlpool galaxies all projected on the big screen from his telescope. A truly remarkable evening.

Some photos from the night depicting the Milky Way! Yes – the sky was that clear!