converting excel file to text file in unix

#1 swakoo

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Posted 25 November 2004 - 05:07 AM

I am currently using an unix environment. i need to convert excel file into text file as i don't think pl/sql can read excel file. Is it possible to convert it into .txt format? as my job are mainly for batch processing thus i hope it to be with little or no manual work done..
How can this be done? if possible please give more detail as i am quite new to the tools i am using.
thanks..

#2 Dapper Dan

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Posted 25 November 2004 - 07:32 AM

What is the file extension of the file you wish to convert? .xls?

#3 egorgry

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Posted 25 November 2004 - 03:55 PM

There is a command line tool called xls2csv. it will convert excel spreadsheets to a comma separtated text file.

just install the pkg for your distro if it's not already installed and check out the man page. IF you have alot of files in one directory you could just do something like

for i in *.xls
do
xls2csv $1
done

#4 Dapper Dan

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Posted 25 November 2004 - 05:45 PM

gnumeric will open .xls files, and I'm fairly certain you can then save it as a text file.

#5 egorgry

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Posted 25 November 2004 - 07:20 PM

Gnumeric will work for you as well as openoffice it's kind of a pain if you need to convert a lot of files. there is an error in my script replace the $1 with a $i that will work.