"I didn't realize Excel couldn't write back to the database. It shouldn't be too hard to develop an extension for that purpose, would it?"
Well, more accurately, it can write back to the database, but normal usage of Excel won't afford that result. Normal usage of Excel you have an independent value.
It is also a dubious proposition as to whether we want people to actually write back to the central database; you'd be one stray macro away from disaster. You sorta want it if someone manually corrects something, but not if they operate on it programmatically, and now we're making things really complicated.
Well, more accurately, it can write back to the database, but normal usage of Excel won't afford that result. Normal usage of Excel you have an independent value.
It is also a dubious proposition as to whether we want people to actually write back to the central database; you'd be one stray macro away from disaster. You sorta want it if someone manually corrects something, but not if they operate on it programmatically, and now we're making things really complicated.