[austinsharp]

I was surprised to see no mention of automation tools like IFTTT and Tasker. These sorts of overarching automation oriented tools let people solve a lot of problems by stitching together things that aren't designed to work together.

I would actually put Excel in this original category. Part of Excel's utility is that it is really good at enabling building of dashboards, applications, whatever. While Excel's builders didn't have D&D character sheets in mind, they definitely expect users to do unanticipated things with the software, just as much as IFTTT or Tasker would.

In some ways this is a "platform" type of perspective. "Here's a bunch of building blocks, go do whatever you think you need" is really powerful once the network effect of building blocks gets big enough. Any tool with a built-in DSL or workflow builder type of UI is probably in this category.

[ryanf]

It's funny that you mention IFTTT because one of the inspirations for its creation was the book Thoughtless Acts?, which is full of photos like the ones in this post: https://ifttt.com/explore/ifttt-the-beginning

They used to give a copy to new employees, but it seems to be out of print now.