A programmer input in a programming language is received, where the programmer input includes i) a built-in function of a computational application corresponding to retrieving data from electronic storage objects, and ii) a first parameter specifying the electronic storage object from which data is to be retrieved. The computational application evaluates the programmer input to generate one or more messages corresponding to requests for a server to retrieve data from the electronic storage object. The one or more messages are sent to the server to retrieve data from the electronic storage object. Data retrieved from the electronic storage object by the server is received, and the retrieved data is made available in a document for processing by the computational application, where the retrieved data is in a format recognized by the computational application.