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Google caters to productivity pros with macro recording in Sheets

It's really exciting if you work on spreadsheets for a living. Really.

If your work revolves around spreadsheets, there's a good chance you depend on macros -- those automated actions can save you hours upon hours of repetitive effort. They've been a pain in Google Sheets, however, as you've had to rely on complicated scripts. It should be much easier in the next few weeks. Google is adding macro recording to Sheets, making automation just a matter of walking through the necessary steps yourself. You still have to dive into scripts when you want to edit macros, but this should help you spend more time working on budget reports and less time getting ready to work.

Sheets is also receiving a few seemingly minor updates that could be huge in the right circumstances. You can now add printing page breaks, custom paper sizes and checkboxes in cells. You have more options for grouping columns and rows, and you can group data by time in pivot tables. Is this going to be meaningless for most people? You bet -- but Google needs these kinds of niche case features if it's going to lure you away from Excel.