Spreadsheet packages are quite helpful in applications requiring the input and manipulation of numeric data. They offer a tabular format of "cells" which can hold text, numbers, or computational formulas. A key feature is that formulas may reference other cells, so changing one value affects all values related to it. Spreadsheets often include statistical analysis utilities as well as other mathematical operations. This lets the user manipulate the data in a wide variety of ways. They also include functions to manipulate text data.
