The xlrd Module -- README

### Python package "xlrd"

Purpose: Provide a library for developers to use to extract data from Microsoft Excel (tm) spreadsheet files. It is not an end-user tool.

Author: John Machin, Lingfo Pty Ltd (sjmachin@lexicon.net)

Licence: BSD-style (see licences.py)

Version of xlrd: 0.7.1 -- 2009-05-31

Versions of Python supported: 2.6-2.7.

External modules required:

  The package itself is pure Python with no dependencies on modules or packages outside the standard Python distribution.

Versions of Excel supported: 2004, 2003, XP, 2000, 97, 95, 5.0, 4.0, 3.0, 2.1, 2.0. Support for Excel 2007 .xlsx files scheduled for version 0.7.1.

Outside the current scope: xlrd will safely and reliably ignore any of these if present in the file:

- Charts, Macros, Pictures, any other embedded object. WARNING: currently this includes embedded worksheets.
- VBA modules
- Formulas (results of formula calculations are extracted, of course).
- Comments
- Hyperlinks
- Autofilters, advanced filters, pivot tables, conditional formatting, data validation

Unlikely to be done:

- Handling password-protected (encrypted) files.

Particular emphasis (refer docs for details):

- Operability across OS, regions, platforms
- Handling Excel's date problems, including the Windows / Macintosh four-year differential.
- Providing access to named constants and named groups of cells (from version 0.6.0)
- Providing access to "visual" information: font, "number format", background, border, alignment and protection for cells, height/width etc for rows/columns (from version 0.6.1)

Quick start:

        import xlrd
        book = xlrd.open_workbook("myfile.xls")
        print "The number of worksheets is", book.nsheets
        print "Worksheet name(s):", book.sheet_names()
        sh = book.sheet_by_index(0)
        print sh.name, sh.nrows, sh.ncols
        print "Cell D30 is", sh.cell_value(rowx=29, colx=3)
        for rx in range(sh.nrows):
            print sh.row(rx)
        # Refer to docs for more details.
        # Feedback on API is welcomed.

Another quick start: This will show the first, second and last rows of each sheet in each file:

        OS-prompt>python PYDIR/scripts/runxlrd.py 3rows *blah*.xls

Installation:

- On Windows: use the installer.
- Any OS: Unzip the .zip file into a suitable directory, chdir to that directory, then do "python setup.py install".
- If PYDIR is your Python installation directory: the main files are in PYDIR/Lib/site-packages/xlrd the docs are in the doc subdirectory, and there's a sample script: PYDIR/Scripts/runxlrd.py
- If os.sep != "/": make the appropriate adjustments.

Download URLs:

- http://pypi.python.org/pypi/xlrd
- http://www.lexicon.net/sjmachin/xlrd.htm

Acknowledgements:

- This package started life as a translation from C into Python of parts of a utility called "xlreader" developed by David Giffin. "This product includes software developed by David Giffin <david@giffin.org>."
- OpenOffice.org has truly excellent documentation of the Microsoft Excel file formats and Compound Document file format, authored by Daniel Rentz. See http://sc.openoffice.org
- U+5F20 U+654F: over a decade of inspiration, support, and interesting decoding opportunities.
- Ksenia Marasanova: sample Macintosh and non-Latin1 files, alpha testing
- Backporting to Python 2.1 was partially funded by Journyx - provider of timesheet and project accounting solutions (http://journyx.com/).
- Provision of formatting information in version 0.6.1 was funded by Simplistix Ltd (http://www.simplistix.co.uk/)
- << a growing list of names; see HISTORY.html >>: feedback, testing, test files, ...