I've been scouring for days and I can't seem find what should be an easy answer. The displayed value is not necessarily the value that from cell.InnerText. I see post after post that requires you to look at the cell.StyleIndex property & cell.DataType.value to determine how to get the displayed value. And while I have plugged in some of this code and it works I hit another case I didnt handle where the cell StyleIndex is null which I can only assume the cell is formatted as "General". The on screen value "-39718.96" while the cell.InnerText returns "-39718.959999999999". I realize there is a easy fix to this by Double.Parse(value).ToString() but there seems to be an endless supply of formats https://stackoverflow.com/a/4655716/1713000 and that's a shortlist and dates are another problem. It seems we are left to handle each different style ourselves. Did Microsoft really not create a public api that returns the formatted displayed value and has no one really written a complete solution to handle this cluster of a mess?
Using Openxml for sheets is very difficult (much more so than using it for Word). If I were you I'd use the ClosedXMl nuget package as it simplifies Openxml for sheets.
Will use the ClosedXML lib instead
Related
I have a very interesting issue. I'm trying to create a dynamic chart. This works well for the most part, however, when I change one of my parameters it makes the chart references invalid, which causes an incredibly annoying pop-up saying there are invalid references... I've tried to use an iferror([series formula],[generic formula]) but this is an invalid error.
So, I will accept one of two solutions... Either a way to use iferror() with my series, or a way to turn off the obnoxious pop-up message.
Some more pertinent information :
I'm using dynamic named ranges
The dynamic ranges point to validation boxes (another thing I've considered is figuring out a way to auto-update the validation boxes since the issue is caused when validation box A is changed but B and C aren't changed yet.) The image attached will hopefully help explain....
Thank you for any assistance you can give!!
The problem is when the start date is later than the end date, right? Somewhere I usually use MIN(StartDate,EndDate) as my real start date and MAX(StartDate,EndDate) as my real end date.
I have created 2 columns, the first has a category of a system using data validation, and the second has the description and failures of that system.
The purpose of that is to open a malfunction on some parts.
In a different sheet I wish to do the same only this time I want to choose the system and the description will automatically appear in the next column showing me all the malfunctions I have written on this system.
I am not very good at all the functions of excel. but I still searched for one that might help me. I have tried using the DGET function but it got me nowhere.
Perhaps try the solution here - it's a bit tricky to explain without copy-pasting the whole thing:
https://superuser.com/questions/536234/excel-how-to-vlookup-to-return-multiple-values
Also take a look at vlookup() if you're working across spreadsheets.
As expected, all of the responses you've seen ehere - and probably elsewhere - are ponyers to VLookup, or a refusal to answer your question.
I'm guessing that you're using DGET() because you need to retrieve data from one named column, using a match for a search term in another named column; and you're that because you can't rely on column ordinals or addresses - you have to do it by name.
VLookup won't do that for you: not without extremely complex and fragile array formulae.
The bad news is: Microsoft NEVER published a working example of a DGET() formula or any corresponding VBA Worksheet Function code.
There's page after page of descriptive text and general explanation in the helpfiles and on MSDN: but no working example. Nobody in Redmond ever sat down and made the DGET() function work with a reproducible set of function parameters and published a screen-shot the working formula.
I'll let you guess why that is.
Maybe there's an example somewhere that is, in effect, a VLookup implemented for known column ordinals using DGET(). If there is, I never found it and you won't either: and it would, of course, be useless for any application where you're working with field names instead of known ordinals.
What you need to do is capture the tabulated data range, with field names in the top row, and pass it to a SQL query using ADODB or MS-Query. That bad new for that is that all the MS-JET Excel drivers have a fatal memory leak.
After that fails, you're left exporting the data somewhere that a proper database app can run the SQL: and that's actually the right thing to do, because your attempt at using DGET() is a relational data query.
If you're left with the need to do this entirely in Excel, you have reached a level of desperation normally associated with the last survivor of an airplane crash who, having devoured the charred remains of his unlucky fellow passengers, is finally forced to contemplate the awful exigency of opening and eating the inflight catering meals.
The grisly details for the equivalent in Excel are a Horrible Hack published here:
http://excellerando.blogspot.com/2014/09/from-time-to-time-it-necessary-to.html
I was not able to find the solution anywhere so maybe someone would be able to think of something.
I have a spreadsheet where one of the tabs is build from the cell values from another ones. This is built with blunt =Paste!AB2. Everything is refreshing properly apart from 1 column.
It keeps on displaying the formula sytnax rather than value. All settings in Excel are set up for automatic updates. I sent the spreadsheet to my friend and it had exactly the same problem. I really dont understand why.
Any ideas?
I cant add a screenshot as I lack reputation :)
Check the cell types. (Format Cells -> Number Tab) They are probably set to Text.
If so, change the types to General, then re-enter the formula
I'm considering replacing a (very) large body of Office-automation code with something that works with the Office XML format directly. I'm just starting out, but already I'm worried that it's too big a task.
I'll be dealing with Word, Excel and PowerPoint. So far I've only looked at Word and Excel. It looks like Word documents should be reasonably easy to manipulate, but Excel workbooks look like a nightmare. For example...
In Word, it looks like you could delete a paragraph simply by deleting the corresponding "w:p" tag. However, the supplied code snippet for deleting a row in Excel takes about 150 lines of code(!).
The reason the Excel code is so big is that deleting a row means updating the row indexes of all the subsequent rows, fixing up the "shared strings" table, etc. According to a comment at the top, the code snippet is not even complete, in that it won't deal with a workbook that has tables in it (I can live with that).
What I'm not clear on is whether that's the only restriction that the sample code has. For example, would there also be a problem if the workbook contained a Pivot Table? Or a chart that references data from the same sheet? Or some named ranges? Wouldn't you also have to update the formulae for any cells (etc.) that referenced a row whose row index had changed?
[That's not to mention the "calc chain", which (thankfully) I think you can simply delete since it's only a chache that can be re-built.]
And that's my question, woolly though it is. Just how hard do you have to work do something as simple as deleting a row properly? Is it an insurmountable task?
Also, if there are other, similar issues either with Excel or with Word or PowerPoint, I'd love to hear about them now, before I waste too much time going down a blind alley. Thanks.
Having worked with the Open XML SDK 2.0 for almost two years now I can say that doing seemingly trivial tasks can take many hours and sometimes days to figure out how to do it properly. For example, deleting an Excel row should be fairly straightforward and easy to do right? Nope because not only do you need code to delete your row, but then you have to update all the row indices, update any merged cell references, update hyperlink references, etc. Our internal delete method is close to 500 lines of code to just delete a row and I'm sure we don't have all the cases accounted for either.
The biggest complaint I have is the lack of documentation on how to do the most common tasks. The MSDN section on the Open XML SDK is very limited and whenever you need to do anything complicated you are really on your own. I've had to read the Open XML standard a lot to figure out what certain elements mean and how they should be implemented since I could find very little online.
The other challenging part is if you insert an element in a spot where it doesn't belong or put an invalid attribute on an element you will get a corrupt file when you try and open it. Most of the time you will not get any information on what caused the error and you will have to look at the Open XML standard spec to see what you did wrong.
If you need a fast turnaround time on converting that Office automation code into Open XML and what you are doing is not really basic, then I would say pass. If you have time and the patience to read up on the Word, Excel and PowerPoint XML structures and get familiar with how they relate then I say go for it. In my opinion it is really the only way to have very fine control over these office documents, but there will be a great learning curve when you start.
Oh and just for fun here is how much code is needed to add a comment to an Excel cell.
Just for completeness, here are some libraries I found for working with Excel XML:
www.extremexml.com - a layer on top of the Open XML SDK classes; focusses on injecting data into an existing spreadsheet; handles many of the cross-reference problems I identified in my question. Open source but GPL2 not LGPL. Code looks nice, and documentation is excellent. Does not appear terribly active on codeplex though.
Closed XML - another layer on top of the Open XML SDK - again open source, but with a less restrictive license (MIT). Looks nice, and looks more "active" than the above.
SpreadsheetLight - from what I can tell, a closed-source library sitting atop the Open XML SDK classes. Targeted more at those looking to create a spreadsheet from scratch rather than making changes to existing spreadsheets.
Here is another third party library dedicated to working with OpenXML:
http://www.officewriter.com
In the example cited by amurra above of deleting Excel spreadsheet rows, this is a single method call with this tool. It updates formulas and all the other references for which it seems that 500 lines of code would be required for otherwise.
The OpenXML SDK itself is a great tool for very simple things, but you still have to concern yourself with a lot of the internals of the file format and packaging structure to get things really right.
Here are some additional libraries that can manipulate with OOXML formats:
- GemBox.Spreadsheet (XLSX)
- GemBox.Document (DOCX)
Also GemBox published some articles that demonstrate how to manipulate with OOXML file format with pure .NET (without a use of any library), I think you'll find this interesting:
www.codeproject.com/Articles/15593/Read-and-write-Open-XML-files-MS-Office
(Introduction to SpreadsheetML format and an explanation on how we can read and write worksheet's cell content)
www.codeproject.com/Articles/649064/Show-Word-File-in-WPF
(Introduction to WordprocessingML format and demonstration on how we can read document's text)
I am new to Aspose Cells, having inherited a project that uses it. A requirement was added that numeric values in cells be actual numbers - they were formerly text.
So, I changed calls in the code that called Cell.PutValue() to use the overloaded version of the method that takes the bool isConverted. Passing a value of "true" in that parameter solved the problem for these instances.
However, in other places in the code, we export data from our website into a spreadsheet by using ExcelDesigner.SetDataSource() and ExcelDesigner.Process(). The spreadsheets resulting from this approach also have numbers stored in cells as text.
How can I convert the text to numbers in this case, as I did with the PutValue() case?
It turns out that Aspose uses something called "Smart Markers", which are directives embedded into the cells of template spreadsheets that Aspose Cells uses to decide how data should be inserted into them.
Smart Markers have optional "parameters", which are parenthesized, comma-separated modifiers giving further processing instructions. The "(numeric)" directive achieved the result that I was looking for.
You may also post a query directly in Aspose.Cells forums, in case you need any further assistance. As those forums are monitored by our support and development teams.
Disclosure: I work as developer evangelist at Aspose.