Excell to array

aopen

How to get data from Excell file? I'm using http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=99160.

This object returns me an array (with extra fields)!!!!

What package do you recommend?

NogDog

Personally, I always just save the Excel file as a CSV text file, the use [man]fgetcsv/man to read it into PHP, loading each line of the CSV file as an array of values.

phychion

you can use PHP-ExcelReader(http://sourceforge.net/projects/phpexcelreader),it is a library for read excel files

ahundiak

Or just save the Excel file as an xml file. Easy to read in PHP.

kida462

I have an urgent and possibly difficult problem to solve that relates to this...

I need to make a program that takes an Excel spreadsheet and generates a dynamic web-page for entering measurements and making calculations. The goal is to have the program simple enough for people with no technical knowledge (i.e. writting scripts) to just upload a file (originating from an excel spreadsheet), and end up with a webpage that has the same functionality, but the constants, formulas, labels, etc. cannot be changed...

The problem with all the php-excel parsers I've been looking at (such as those mentioned here) is that they don't seem to extract the formulas into the array (or whatever), but rather the values already calculated in the spreadsheet. As well, it's difficult for me to see how it would be possible to separate which fields in the spreadsheet should be used as constant parameters, and which should become fields (variables) that the user will enter his or her measurements into...

... perhaps I am going about this wrong, or perhaps this is too ambitious a project... OR, perhaps the solution is quite obvious...???

Any help or direction would be greatly appreciated... I am on a deadline, but if anyone thinks this is a do-able project, I would definitely spend the time.

Thanks in advance for any responses. 🙂

ahundiak

It's certainly an ambitious project however if you have the user save the spreadsheet as an XML spreadsheet (just using the Save As command) then you can get at all the formulas.

kida462

Thanks for the reply ahundiak =)...

... this was my first instinct for going about this, and I think you've reassured me this is how it is to be done.

Also, I discussed with the user's, and it turns out they'd be fine if I were to give them a standard for formatting the *.xls files, which will make it even easier to pick out which will become fields (for measurement input), which will be (output) formulas, and which will be labels. This should make getting at and differentiating the corresponding fields from the XML file even easier, possibly trivial...

Thanks again!

Oh, and I'll still be open to (and would appreciate) comments or suggestions if anyone has any 😉.