What is the best way to get data from a Ruby on Rails application into an Excel spreadsheet?

Question

I know what you think, just load the data into CSV and import into Excel.

Unfortunately, we need the user to be able to select some data from the Rails application, and then easily (i.e. with as little user intervention as possible - ideally with the click of a button) export it and open it in an existing Excel spreadsheet, which contains various formulas and macros, etc. that will be applied to the data.

My ideal solution would be related to most of the heavy lifting at the end of Rails, since where my skills lie, but I think there might be some material for Excel web integration that might help.

Anyway, can I get some recommendations regarding good approaches to this?

Answer 1

axlsx is probably the most comprehensive implementation for deep work with excel. https://github.com/randym/axlsx

Here is an example that creates one of the skydrive templates for Microsoft:

require 'axlsx'

Axlsx::Package.new do |p|
  p.workbook do |wb|
    styles = wb.styles
    header = styles.add_style :bg_color => "DD", :sz => 16, :b => true, :alignment => {:horizontal => :center}
    tbl_header = styles.add_style :b => true, :alignment => { :horizontal => :center }
    ind_header = styles.add_style :bg_color => "FFDFDEDF", :b => true, :alignment => {:indent => 1}
    col_header  = styles.add_style :bg_color => "FFDFDEDF", :b => true, :alignment => { :horizontal => :center }
    label       = styles.add_style :alignment => { :indent => 1 }
    money       = styles.add_style :num_fmt => 5
    t_label       = styles.add_style :b => true, :bg_color => "FFDFDEDF"
    t_money = styles.add_style :b => true, :num_fmt => 5, :bg_color => "FFDFDEDF"

    wb.add_worksheet do |sheet|
      sheet.add_row
      sheet.add_row [nil, "College Budget"], :style => [nil, header]
      sheet.add_row
      sheet.add_row [nil, "What coming in this month.", nil, nil, "How am I doing"], :style => tbl_header
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Item", "Amount", nil, "Item", "Amount"], :style => [nil, ind_header, col_header, nil, ind_header, col_header]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Estimated monthly net income", 500, nil, "Monthly income", "=C9"], :style => [nil, label, money, nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Financial aid", 100, nil, "Monthly expenses", "=C27"], :style =>  [nil, label, money, nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Allowance from mom & dad", 20000, nil, "Semester expenses", "=F19"], :style =>  [nil, label, money, nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Total", "=SUM(C6:C8)", nil, "Difference", "=F6 - SUM(F7:F8)"], :style => [nil, t_label, t_money, nil, t_label, t_money]
      sheet.add_row
      sheet.add_row [nil, "What going out this month.", nil, nil, "Semester Costs"], :style => tbl_header
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Item", "Amount", nil, "Item", "Amount"], :style => [nil, ind_header, col_header, nil, ind_header, col_header]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Rent", 650, nil, "Tuition", 200], :style =>  [nil, label, money, nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Utilities", 120, nil, "Lab fees", 50], :style =>  [nil, label, money, nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Cell phone", 100, nil, "Other fees", 10], :style =>  [nil, label, money, nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Groceries", 75, nil, "Books", 150], :style =>  [nil, label, money, nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Auto expenses", 0, nil, "Deposits", 0], :style =>  [nil, label, money, nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Student loans", 0, nil, "Transportation", 30], :style =>  [nil, label, money, nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Other loans", 350, nil, "Total", "=SUM(F13:F18)"], :style => [nil, label, money, nil, t_label, t_money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Credit cards", 450], :style => [nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Insurance", 0], :style => [nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Laundry", 10], :style => [nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Haircuts", 0], :style => [nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Medical expenses", 0], :style => [nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Entertainment", 500], :style => [nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Miscellaneous", 0], :style => [nil, label, money]
      sheet.add_row [nil, "Total", "=SUM(C13:C26)"], :style => [nil, t_label, t_money]
      sheet.add_chart(Axlsx::Pie3DChart) do |chart|
        chart.title = sheet["B11"]
        chart.add_series :data => sheet["C13:C26"], :labels => sheet["B13:B26"]
        chart.start_at 7, 2
        chart.end_at 12, 15
      end
      sheet.add_chart(Axlsx::Bar3DChart, :barDir => :col) do |chart|
        chart.title = sheet["E11"]
        chart.add_series :labels => sheet["E13:E18"], :data => sheet["F13:F18"]
        chart.start_at 7, 16
        chart.end_at 12, 31
      end
      sheet.merged_cells.concat ["B4:C4","E4:F4","B11:C11","E11:F11","B2:F2"]
      sheet.column_widths 2, nil, nil, 2, nil, nil, 2
    end
 end
 p.use_shared_strings = true
 p.serialize 'axlsx.xlsx'
end

Answer 2

The exporting part is rather well covered at least - here are a couple of potential stones:

• spreadsheet
• roo

I suspect (hopefully!) That as soon as you have the data in XLS form, the rest should be on the client side.

- Excel Web Query? , , (, ) Excel. ...

Answer 3

Ryan Bates just released a free short screencast on railscasts.com on   CSV and Excel Export