[Resolved] How to display Excel Spreadsheets in browser?

kilbey1

Ok, I've been faced with a task of allowing a user to view 2 Excel spreadsheets, side by side, in a browser window. The requirements are minimal - just display, no edit required. The user viewing the file typically has Excel installed on their machine. No, I can't install the Excel executable on the server (yet, it's a shared box).

Version of Excel each user has is usually 2000; PHP is > 4.2. Pear can be installed on my local machine for testing - but unlikely if we continue to host on a shared box. (We are looking into other solutions)

Any tips and links to how I can accomplish this?

Thanks!

ccgorman

Could you not just use frames?

If they do not like that idea then iframes, and if they don't like that idea then div tags?

<frameset cols="50%,50%" frameborder="0" bordercolor="#FFFFFF" border="0">
<frame src="excel1.xls" name="excel1" noresize="yes" scrolling="yes">
<frame src="excel2.xls" name="excel2" noresize="yes" scrolling="yes">
<noframes>
<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
<p>Use a <b>frames-capable</b> browser.</p>
</body>
</noframes>
</frameset>

kilbey1

Sounds good for the side-by-side part.

But don't I need to do something special to display the Excel spreadsheet for the user?

Edit:

I have been reading something about the php_libconv.dll and enabled it. I found a script that appears to output my Excel spreadsheet to CSV - but this isn't what I really want, I'd like it to appear in some formatted output. Is there anything that will format it nicely, or do I have to go about putting the CSV format into some readable format?

Weedpacket

Originally posted by kilbey1
But don't I need to do something special to display the Excel spreadsheet for the user?

Since you're talking about Excel you're pretty much assuming a Microsoft shop. Given the right Content-Type header (which escapes me for the moment - www.iana.org should have it in its list of media types) Internet Explorer will open an instance of Excel in the frame to display the document. Personally, it's one reason I don't use Internet Explorer, but of course you're not doing this for me🙂

kilbey1

Thanks for all your help! I ended up finding a script that pulls out the data, and with a little HTML formatting, have it displaying nicely on a page.

I've included the script in its entirety for anyone looking for a future solution. (of course, you should change the code to fit your own needs)