Excel with xml & # 8594; source and guide for tags and attributes

Question

Excel can directly open XML files and display them as good Excel files.

An example can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Office_XML_formats#Excel_XML_Spreadsheet_example

I try to find the source on tags and attributes that are used on the general structure, but I could not find them.

I am very unfamiliar with all this. I don’t even know where to start.

Any help is appreciated.

Sincerely.

Answer 1

To work with Excel spreadsheets or any other Microsoft Office documents, I suggest you study the new Office Open XML ( OOXML ), rather than the earlier Microsoft Office XML format that you are quoting.

OOXML offers advantages over earlier Microsoft Office XML formats :

• OOXML reigns in many version dependencies that suffer from earlier Office XML formats.
• OOXML is defined by an international standard (ECMA-376).
• OOXML uses a more intelligent packaging system ( OPC ); the earlier format embeds the binary in a large, monolithic XML file.
• OOXML can represent the full authenticity of a document, including VBA macros, graphical objects, paths, custom views, etc.

The standard Office ECMA-376 online documentation file formats define dictionaries for OOXML.

Non-Microsoft OOXML Resources :

Others provided official Microsoft documentation. In addition to the ECMA and ISO / IEC organization links listed above, some useful resources are provided beyond what Microsoft provides:

• Eric White has an extensive collection of tutorials, screenshots and examples on OOXML . Eric was an evangelist developer at Microsoft during the OOXML standardization and development period. His work from this period should be read for developers who want to work with OOXML.
• How much does Open XML cost?
• open xml excel reading cell value
• Creating an Excel document using OpenXml sdk 2.0
• Simple OOXML is great for creating and modifying OOXML. Open source.

You mentioned in your question, wanting to find a "source by tags and attributes." You can download reference XSD (as well as RelaxNG non-standard schemes) here . There is also a document on the basics of Office Open XML , which has many examples and explanations.

Answer 2

The topic of using XML in Excel (and Office in general) is quite broad. Then I will focus on your specific question (source on tags and attributes that are used and on the general structure) and additional (mostly practical) sources that I think you need to go to.

Given that you mention that you are unfamiliar before having a link to tags, etc., you probably would like to read some kind of user manual on what you can achieve with XML and Excel. You will probably want to do more than just open the XML files as an example that you specified on Wikipedia . You can make XML and Excel interact. A good starter for this is XML Overview in Excel .

Regarding your request for sources:

• A good link for tags is provided in an external link on Wikipedia , which is an XML Table Reference . Also note the tag hierarchy .
• To learn about the structure:
  • See this starter and this ./li>
  • Wikipedia also contains information, including links to official ECMA information .
  • The information officeopenxml.com is also very helpful.

Additional notes:

• When developing XML-Excel, be sure to use the XML Source taskbar (Developer -> XML -> Source).
• Note the Limitations and Differences (Microsoft Office XML Formats) with Office Open XML (Office Open XML started with Office 2007).
• Interestingly, you can take an Excel file (say myfile.xlsx), change it to myfile.zip or myfile.xlsx.zip and extract / examine its contents. Xlsx files are only ZIP containers. Doing this can be instructive (and time consuming).

Other useful links:

• Office Open XML Essentials .
• Introducing Open XML File Formats for Office (2007) .
• White paper from the beginning (note that http://www.openxmlformats.org is redirected to http://www.microsoft.com ).
• Software that supports Office Open XML ( spreadsheets and others). There are many open sources, and they include spreadsheet software, viewers, filters and converters, software support, etc.

This is just a summary of pointers. Hope this helps.