I’m working with Python and JavaScript at an intermediate level and want to build a web app that combines spreadsheet functionality with database features. I need to create something similar to popular hybrid database tools but with a custom approach.
The main features I want to include are:
- Moving rows around with drag and drop
- Different view modes like kanban boards and gallery layouts
- File attachment support with preview options
- Switching between table view and form input view
- Multiple users working together in real time
- Data analysis tools like pivot tables
- Custom reports with charts and data exports
I’ve found some commercial widget libraries that offer parts of what I need, but I’m not sure if mixing different paid components from various vendors will work well together.
Should I invest in premium UI components or look for open source alternatives? Has anyone here built something similar and can share their experience? I’m also wondering if building everything from scratch would be more reliable in the long run.
Any advice or resources would be really helpful!
Built a similar beast last year for manufacturing data tracking. Key lesson: pick your battles.
Don’t go all premium or all open source. Cherry pick by complexity. For drag and drop rows, I used react-beautiful-dnd - free and handles edge cases that took me weeks to solve manually.
Real game changer? Canvas rendering for large datasets. Started with DOM manipulation, hit walls around 5000 rows. Switched to react-window with custom renderers - everything’s snappy now.
For pivot tables and charts, invest in something solid like Chart.js or D3. Building data viz from scratch is an endless rabbit hole. Trust me.
What others missed - backend architecture beats frontend widgets. We used Redis for caching computed views, made switching between table/kanban/gallery instant. Users notice that.
File attachments get messy fast. Use AWS S3 with CloudFront. Don’t handle previews in your main app - spin up a separate microservice. Keeps your core app clean when things break.
Start with table view and real-time sync first. Get those rock solid before fancy views. You’ll thank yourself later.
skip the fancy features at first - nail down data consistency instead. i built cool stuff before handling concurrent edits properly and users kept overwriting each other’s work. get operational transforms or crdts working first, then worry about making it look pretty.
I built something similar two years ago - an internal project management tool. Tried piecing together different commercial components first, but ended up with a hybrid approach that worked great. Used Luckysheet (open source) for spreadsheets since it handles drag and drop rows plus most of the heavy lifting. Added Socket.io for real-time collaboration and it ran surprisingly smooth. Biggest pain was getting different view modes working - had to write custom components for kanban and gallery views because existing solutions were either crazy expensive or wouldn’t integrate properly. Handled file attachments through a separate service with backend preview generation. Pro tip: start with something solid like Django REST or Express.js. Makes adding features way easier down the road. This mixed approach saved me about six months compared to building from scratch, and cost way less than going full premium.
For real-time collaboration, go with Yjs as your sync engine. I spent months fighting conflict resolution nightmares with Socket.io alone - switching to Yjs completely transformed our multi-user experience. It handles operational transforms automatically and works with most frontend frameworks. For components, premium widgets bite you with hidden integration costs. We went with AG Grid Community (free) for the main table since it supports custom cell renderers and has solid drag-drop. Here’s what nobody talks about enough: data modeling flexibility. We used PostgreSQL with JSONB columns for dynamic schema data. You get relational integrity plus the flexibility users expect from spreadsheet tools. This made pivot tables way simpler since we could use native SQL aggregation while letting users add custom fields on the fly.
hey, have u tried looking at react-table? it’s pretty flexible and allows for lotsa customization. also, for real-time stuff, maybe firebase? but mixing paid libs can get tricky, real talk. sometimes building ur own might save headaches later.