❑ Workflow management
❑ Calculation engines
As an example, consider a timesheet reporting system, where each member of staff has an Excel workbook
to enter their time on a daily basis. At the end of each month, they connect to the Internet and send
their timesheets to an application running on a web server. That application stores the submitted data in
a central database. Some time later, a manager connects to the server and is sent the submitted hours for
her staff. She checks the numbers and authorizes payment, sending her authorization code back to the
server. The payroll department retrieves the authorized timesheet data from the same web server
directly into its accounting system and processes the payments.
In this business process, Excel is used for the front-end client, providing a rich and powerful user interface,
yet it only fulfils a specific part of the overall process. The server application maintains the data
(the completed timesheets) and presents it in whichever format is appropriate for the specific part of the
process.
By using the Internet and standard data formats for this two-way communication, you can easily integrate
Excel clients with completely separate systems, as in the payroll system in the example, and allow
the business process to operate outside of the corporate network.