Opening Excel 2003 XML docs ends up in Writer

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nickduddy
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Joined: Fri May 09, 2008 5:32 am

Opening Excel 2003 XML docs ends up in Writer

Post by nickduddy »

Hi,

I've been experimenting with OO recently (on Windows and mac OS) and have come across what would be a show stopper for me - the seeming inability to open "Excel 2003 XML" documents. When I try, either from Calc or by double clicking, they always open in Writer in an unusable format instead of being a regular spreadsheet which I can work on. I've only been able to test this on Windows so far - my Mac is at home.

If I resave this document in Excel as "Excel Workbook" it is then OK in Calc - but that's no use to me as our users receive Excel 2003 XML files from an automaticed system which they need to be able to work on.

I've tested in both OO2.4 and the 3.0 beta on seperate PCs and get the exact same results. Any advice?

Nick.
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Hagar Delest
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Re: Opening Excel 2003 XML docs ends up in Writer

Post by Hagar Delest »

Can you upload a sample file here? It seems to work fine usually: Microsoft Excel 2003 XML (xml) support?
LibreOffice 7.6.2.1 on Xubuntu 23.10 and 7.6.4.1 portable on Windows 10
nickduddy
Posts: 2
Joined: Fri May 09, 2008 5:32 am

Re: Opening Excel 2003 XML docs ends up in Writer

Post by nickduddy »

Actually, I can now add a bit to the puzzle.

After looking more closely at these documents and then replicating it with a dummy doc, I can see that these documents are essentially the result of a 'save as webpage' in Excel, NOT an Excel XML format. They are programatically generated really and it's an external system which we won't be able to have modified.

As documents, they open up in a presentable but varying formats in browsers, I tested IE and Firefox on Windows and Safari and Firefox on my Mac. The 'problem' is that as they are used in my business, they need to be opened and editable as a spreadsheet and so far I haven't been able to do that in anything but Excel.

I'm going to keep poking about but maybe just have to accept that OO hasn't got this capability at this time. I'd love to know if it's on the roadmap or if it's been discussed before.
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Hagar Delest
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Re: Opening Excel 2003 XML docs ends up in Writer

Post by Hagar Delest »

I don't know, try the issue tracker and upload a file sample on their site (giving all the details for the external application): [Tutorial] Reporting bugs.
LibreOffice 7.6.2.1 on Xubuntu 23.10 and 7.6.4.1 portable on Windows 10
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