Howdy, I remember a podcast where they have the example of Microsoft Excel as an example for an introduction to functional programming. I believe it was an SE Radio podcast on Clojure or that build tool it uses. It doesn't really matter.
I already understood functional concepts and try to use them where I can in Java and other languages. (It is easier to reason about immutable data and pure methods.) I found the metaphor of Excel very interesting though. Because that's basically what it is. I'm sure there are ways to have it not act functionally but the vast majority of the time it is, and I think more people have the basic vocabulary of Excel than functional programming.
Has anyone ever used this or heard of it being used as an example while teaching fp?
There are a lot of shitty "programming lite" tools for business folks, essentially "Scratch Enterprise" lol, but many many people know how to use Excel. I think there might be a little more market than you think for helping business folks learn some programming. But still, "real" functional languages are not a great first step necessarily.