How to Create and Edit Excel Spreadsheets in PHP

PHP is highly enriched with features of a good scripting language. It provides numerous libraries for specific purposes. PHP provides a library to deal with Excel files. It is called PHP Excel library. It enables you to read and write spreadsheets in various formats including csv, xls, ods, and xlsx. You will need to ensure that you have PHP’s upgraded version not older than PHP 5.2 . Moreover, you should have installed extensions php_qd2, php_xml and php_zip.

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Spreadsheet creation is a very common use case in PHP development. It is used to export data to an Excel spreadsheet. Below is the code for creating an excel spreadsheet using the PHP Excel library.

Code:

//Including PHPExcel library and creation of its object

require('PHPExcel.php');

$phpExcel = new PHPExcel;

// Setting font to Arial Black

$phpExcel->getDefaultStyle()->getFont()->setName('Arial Black');

// Setting font size to 14

$phpExcel->getDefaultStyle()->getFont()->setSize(14);

//Setting description, creator and title

$phpExcel ->getProperties()->setTitle("Vendor list");

$phpExcel ->getProperties()->setCreator("Robert");

$phpExcel ->getProperties()->setDescription("Excel SpreadSheet in PHP");

// Creating PHPExcel spreadsheet writer object

// We will create xlsx file (Excel 2007 and above)

$writer = PHPExcel_IOFactory::createWriter($phpExcel, "Excel2007");

// When creating the writer object, the first sheet is also created

// We will get the already created sheet

$sheet = $phpExcel ->getActiveSheet();

// Setting title of the sheet

$sheet->setTitle('My product list');

// Creating spreadsheet header

$sheet ->getCell('A1')->setValue('Vendor');

$sheet ->getCell('B1')->setValue('Amount');

$sheet ->getCell('C1')->setValue('Cost');

// Making headers text bold and larger

$sheet->getStyle('A1:D1')->getFont()->setBold(true)->setSize(14);

// Insert product data

// Autosize the columns

$sheet->getColumnDimension('A')->setAutoSize(true);

$sheet->getColumnDimension('B')->setAutoSize(true);

$sheet->getColumnDimension('C')->setAutoSize(true);

// Save the spreadsheet

$writer->save('products.xlsx');

Alternate Approach:

Alternatively, spreadsheet can be downloaded rather than saving it to the server. You may use the following code:

header('Content-Type: application/vnd.ms-excel');

header('Content-Disposition: attachment;filename="file.xlsx"');

header('Cache-Control: max-age=0');

$writer->save('php://output');

How To Edit an Existing Spreadsheet in PHP?

The editing process is rather similar to the spreadsheet creation process. Use the following code to do this:

// Include PHPExcel library and create its object

require('PHPExcel.php');

// Load an existing spreadsheet

$phpExcel = PHPExcel_IOFactory::load('products.xlsx');

// Get the first sheet

$sheet = $phpExcel ->getActiveSheet();

// Remove 2 rows starting from the row 2

$sheet ->removeRow(2,2);

// Insert one new row before row 2

$sheet->insertNewRowBefore(2, 1);

// Create the PHPExcel spreadsheet writer object

// We will create xlsx file (Excel 2007 and above)

$writer = PHPExcel_IOFactory::createWriter($phpExcel, "Excel2007");

// Save the spreadsheet

$writer->save('products.xlsx');

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How To Prepare Spreadsheets for Printing?

To get a spreadsheet ready, you should set size, margins and paper orientation.

$sheet->getPageSetup()->setOrientation(PHPExcel_Worksheet_PageSetup::ORIENTATION_LANDSCAPE);

$sheet -> getPageSetup()->setPaperSize(PHPExcel_Worksheet_PageSetup::PAPERSIZE_A4);

$sheet->getPageMargins()->setTop(1);

$sheet ->getPageMargins()->setRight(0.75);

$sheet ->getPageMargins()->setLeft(0.75);

$sheet ->getPageMargins()->setBottom(1);

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Conclusion

The PHPExcel library is very useful for calculations and charts. It is often used to store data in Excel sheets or to import data from Excel spreadsheets via PHP website. Got any questions about what we discussed? Leave a comment and I’ll get back to you!

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Shahzeb Ahmed

Shahzeb is a Digital Marketer with a Software Engineering background, works as a Community Manager — PHP Community at Cloudways. He is growth ambitious and aims to learn & share information about PHP & Laravel Development through practice and experimentation. He loves to travel and explore new ideas whenever he finds time. Get in touch with him at [email protected]

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