Home Forums Discussions Problems Excel spreadsheet problem

Periodically when we try to open an Excel spreadsheet in the imported items area of AC, it will not open within the AC pane, but instead opens Excel and appears there. Over the years I have spent more hours than I should trying to make this work; for a certain group of our patients, these sheets are invaluable so I keep making the effort. (I also do it out of stubbornness). Generally the spreadsheet opens in the pane on the right, as it should, but sometimes it will not. I have posted about this before. Using what I have learned in the past won?t fix the issue at this time on this machine.

From what I understand, the imported items viewing pane is treated like a browser, so the operating system (Win7 in this case) looks to see what the default browser is, and then for the default program to open spreadsheets (.xls, etc files) within the browser. I think I have set these appropriately but it seems that once the default is set incorrectly, AC doesn?t check again and there is no changing it back. So everything was fine, then some change resulted in a different default program being used and now I can?t get back to Excel.
Any ideas? (Win7 with Chrome as the default browser; just as it is on several other machines which work just fine).

Are some of the files xls files and others xlsx files? One is Excel 2003 the other is 2007 and higher.

JamesNT

There were some of each. In the past, a mis-match (e.g. trying to open an xls file with a 2007 version of Excel) would cause this problem. At this point, neither will open natively. Converting all of the files to the same type was not helpful either.

I hate to ask this, but if this has to do with AC, if you tired setting the correct default program, then uninstalling/re-installing AC?

As I have said before, it would be better if AC called the OS, and let the OS handle the default program call. I can think of several cases where this would be the correct approach, and not hard-calling Infernal Explorer (for example).

Jon,

I don?t know if this will help or not, but one alternative is to re-save (use Save As?) your Excel files as a single web file (*.mht; *.mhtml) in MS Office. You can also re-save your spreadsheet files as an HTML (.html) document in OpenOffice.org Calc, if you don?t have MS Office. Both ways will allow your original spreadsheet files to remain intact.

You?ll have to import the new saved web file instead of the original native spreadsheet file. Then you?ll be able to view the content in the Imported Items, right-side pane without any problems. Unfortunately, as you have already figured out, AC is using a browser container for its viewing pane.

You wouldn?t be able to properly view rows and columns, as you would in its native application (MS Excel or OpenOffice Calc). Only the content as a webpage would be viewable.

Probably, you have already tried the above, but I thought I?d share anyway. I hope this helps somewhat.

Right on with Indy?s post, too!

Thanks for the ideas, Lawrence, but I need to be able to view, modify, and view again the document.

You?re welcome, Jon.

I?m sorry my tips weren?t much help to your need from an application stand point. Unfortunately, this is more of a design and programmatic issue with Imported Items. As much as I want to help, I?ve traveled this road before? Maybe one day AC will upgrade their current browser viewer to a true document viewer (Pssst? AC, here?s a hint for the future - WPF), or a universal document container, which would allow editable documents and spreadsheets.

Maybe AC will get it right this time. As you already know, I?m known to get their attention real fast. I hope this helps. Let me know when you need me!

It's been well over a year, but I seem to remember writing extensively on this subject when I had it working. But, then maybe it was another blog on Excel, so I don't think I would waste your time using our wonderful search feature.

Any way one of us can remote in to check out the issue?

Did this issue end up getting resolved?

***EDIT***
I typed something below, but it may not deserve to be read.

Is the problem that opening an Excel file from the Imported Items tab opens the excel file in its own window AND that the data in this window cannot be edited and saved?

Or is the problem just that the file doesn't open in the pane?

If the problem is the former, than what I typed might be helpful.
***/EDIT***

If not, I thought of a hack that could serve as temporary relief; ultimately, the excel problem really should be fixed.

First of all. Imported items is pretty easy to get to.
Go to C:\Program Files\Amazing Charts\Import Items
If you open Import Items, you will see a bunch of folders numbered in the thousands (i.e. 1000, 1001, .... 2235, ....) These folders correspond to the imported items of individual patients. Folder 1000 is the folder for imported items of the first patient that was ever created in your AC database.

So how do you find out what folder numbers correspond to what patients? If you go to the main AC window and type in a name, just left of that name, AC displays his/her ID number.

So how can this help you?
Import a document that has a hyperlink (how you make this link will depend on what type of document you decide to make, e.g. pdf or doc). You should make this link take you directly to the excel file. Now you can access your excel file from AC (albeit not in the AC pane), view it, modify it, and save it.

It's not the ugliest hack. Depending on how many patients you have that need excel spreadsheets, it might be a pain to make documents with links for all of them.