Both of these are true. And most people do not appreciate how tricky niche apps are. When I started writing PartsBox (for myself initially, later grew it into a business at https://partsbox.io/) several years ago, I thought I'd be done in a weekend. Nearly 4 years and almost 3000 commits later…
Spreadsheets are a pain for anything but the simplest things. And yet they are useful to a point, because making a domain-specific application is surprisingly hard: there are lots of edge cases that you don't think about initially.
"There was once a programmer who was attached to the court of the warlord of Wu. The warlord asked the programmer: "Which is easier to design: an accounting package or an operating system?"
"An operating system," replied the programmer.
The warlord uttered an exclamation of disbelief. "Surely an accounting package is trivial next to the complexity of an operating system," he said.
"Not so," said the programmer, "When designing an accounting package, the programmer operates as a mediator between people having different ideas: how it must operate, how its reports must appear, and how it must conform to the tax laws. By contrast, an operating system is not limited by outside appearances. When designing an operating system, the programmer seeks the simplest harmony between machine and ideas. This is why an operating system is easier to design."
The warlord of Wu nodded and smiled. "That is all good and well, but which is easier to debug?"
The programmer made no reply."