Causal

Web and SaaS

spreadsheet modelling

SHOW HN2019

148points
30comments
#292of 2,195 in 2019
Top 14%of 2019 by points

How HN took it

CuriousMostly questions and neutral comments

1 positive, 17 neutral or asking, 1 mixed, 2 critical, out of 21 comments about the project. Thread score -0.09.

Idea: 0 for, 1 againstExecution: 0 for, 1 against

The thread, comment by comment

Each row is a top-level comment and its replies, in HN's order. Select a cell to open that comment on HN.

positive neutral or mixed critical about another commenter or something else the maker

What HN said

What people liked

  • Useful idea; Guesstimate and similar tools exist

    From 1 comment
    • In fact there is an example of this kind of sensitivity analysis tool already offered at https://www.getguesstimate.com (not my venture, but a friend’s). It’s like a spreadsheet…
      ricksunny on HN

Objections

  • Assumes independent input variables, a limitation for dependent inputs

    From 1 comment
    • Yep — we assume that the input variables are independent. This is more acceptable in some settings than others, so as always, it's good to understand the limitations of the…
      refrigerator on HN
  • Excel is error-prone for important models

    From 1 comment
    • There are three answers to this: - Do you really want to be using important models in such an error-prone and difficult to test environment as Excel? There's a whole Spreadsheet…
      emarsden on HN
  • Only uniform input distributions in the sensitivity analysis

    From 1 comment
    • We actually assume uniform distributions for the inputs of the sensitivity analysis. This tool is a standalone thing, and you're right — it's similar to TopRank. Our actual…
      refrigerator on HN

Requests

  • Support for dependent input variables

    From 2 comments
    • I see you're using a variance based approach. How does it handle a dependent structure? To my knowledge, Sobol indices assume that the input variables are independent.
      sheikheddy on HN
    • There has been some exploration into variance based global sensitivity analysis for models with dependent inputs. [1][2][3]…
      sheikheddy on HN

Questions

  • How it differs from Excel data tables and tornado plots

    From 1 comment
    • Hi Lukas. Thanks for making this. I will ask the obvious question: how is this different from the sensitivity analysis provided in the built in data table functionality? I'll say…
      omarhaneef on HN
  • How it differs from Excel Solver and Palisade @Risk

    From 2 comments
    • I don't want to dismiss this out of hand, but what does it do that the Excel Solver doesn't? Excel, LibreOffice Calc etc. are very comprehensive tools, that include a lot of…
      zozbot234 on HN
    • Does it cover a different use case compared to Palisade @Risk?
      omega3 on HN
  • How users without modelling expertise avoid misusing the statistics

    From 1 comment
    • I'm late to the party. Hoping you can answer a question. On the one hand, you're lowering the bar to do useful statistical work, which is awesome. A new set of people will be…
      6gvONxR4sf7o on HN

Alternatives named

  • Guesstimate

    From 1 comment
    • In fact there is an example of this kind of sensitivity analysis tool already offered at https://www.getguesstimate.com (not my venture, but a friend’s). It’s like a spreadsheet…
      ricksunny on HN
  • Palisade @Risk and TopRank

    From 2 comments
    • Does it cover a different use case compared to Palisade @Risk?
      omega3 on HN
    • Thanks for the reply. Does your tool assume that the variables are normally distributed for the Monte Carlo analysis you run? It looks like your tool is closer to TopRank from…
      omega3 on HN
  • Excel data tables

    From 1 comment
    • Hi Lukas. Thanks for making this. I will ask the obvious question: how is this different from the sensitivity analysis provided in the built in data table functionality? I'll say…
      omarhaneef on HN
  • Sheetless

    From 1 comment
    • Also: https://sheetless.io/ Relevant to understanding causality in systems: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_leverage_points
      pgt on HN

Category, keywords, summaries and labels on this page were made by AI (Thread Reader v2) and not checked by hand. Each point links to the comments it came from.

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