I am using apache poi 3.14 to create an excel file, that must contains differents types of datas, including dates.
My code works fine in most of the cases.
I'm facing problems when writing specifics dates (java.util.Date) in cells.
Here is my code :
Date date;
// code where I get the value of date
Cell currentCell = currentRow.createCell(fieldPos++);
// line below doesn't work for date like '11/11/1811' but work for '11/11/2111'
currentCell.setCellValue(date);
currentCell.setCellStyle(myDateStyle);
Let's suppose I have 3 dates to write:
01/01/2009
11/11/2111
11/11/1811
My excel file will look like that:
| 01/01/2009 | 11/11/2111 | blankcell |
The line currentCell.setCellValue(date) sets the value to -1 when date is equal to 11/11/1811 so in my excel file it appears blank ( according to my dateStyle)
Why it is not working for specific date and how can I fix this ?
Found the cause of this !
setCellValue(Date d) of Apache Poi try to convert a given java.util.Date into an excel "datenumber" :
Excel stores dates and times as a number representing the number of days since 1900-Jan-0, plus a fractional portion of a 24 hour day: ddddd.tttttt . This is called a serial date, or serial date-time.
That's why when given a date before 1900 setCellValue sets the value to -1 cause it can't make the convert operation.
Fixed my problem with calling setCellValue(String s) with the Date.toString() in case of setCellValue(Date d) sets -1 , the only remaining problem is that I alterate the data.
I am using Aspose for creating excel. I am getting few difficulties.
1st issue
Cells.importResultSet in this how to insert customDateFormatString
2nd issue
Cells.importResultSet in this how to insert customNumberFormatString
Please check the below example for number
10000 to $10,000
1) You may put your desired custom date/time format string for the customDateFormatString parameter in Cells.importResultSet() overloaded method. See the sample line of code for your reference:
e.g
Sample code:
worksheet.getCells().importResultSet(rs, 0, 0, true, "d-mmm-yy", true);
2) It is better once you have imported data to Excel worksheet using Cells.importResultSet() method, you may apply your desired number formatting to the cells in the range/column accordingly, see the document for your reference:
http://www.aspose.com/docs/display/cellsjava/Setting+Display+Formats+of+Numbers+and+Dates
In your case, you should set the custom number format string as "$#,##0" for your requirements.
I need to parse a excel file which has a date time(mm/dd/yyyy hh:mm:ss) stored in custom format. When I check the cell type it is indicating a numeric value, but I am not able to retrieve the value. It is displaying the below exception.
java.lang.IllegalStateException: Cannot get a numeric value from a text cell
at org.apache.poi.hssf.usermodel.HSSFCell.typeMismatch(HSSFCell.java:648)
at org.apache.poi.hssf.usermodel.HSSFCell.getNumericCellValue(HSSFCell.java:673)
When i try to read the value as date using 'cell.getDateCellValue()', then also I am getting the same exception.
If I try to retrieve the value as a string, then the exception is just reversed.
Any idea how to make this work ?
I was having similar issues with apache poi.
My suggestion would be to:
1) force the cell to be text cell.setCellType(CELLTYPESTRING)
2) read in the string value cell.getStringCellValue()
3) do something on your end to parse the string into meaningful data
Hope this helps. Apache POI has its limitations so sometimes you have to hack it like that
I am using Apache POI (version 3.9) framework for dealing with excel files, i.e. reading excel file.
I am having trouble with number types. User can write a number in excel file with comma or dot as decimal separator, i.e. 12.34 or 12,34, for various reasons.
Now, I would like to get that value as it is (i.e. if it is 12.34, then I would like to get 12.34, or if it is 12,34, then I would like to get 12,34), but instead POI Cell preliminary gives me a double with dot as decimal separator.
So, if a cell value was 12,34, POI Cell would give double of value 12.34.
This behaviour is not what I would like to be. I would like to get the value that was entered (12,34).
How to avoid/solve this?
I have searched Stackoverflow for similar problems and tried to use solution given in thread How can I read numeric strings in Excel cells as string (not numbers) with Apache POI? and also tried using alternative org.apache.poi.ss.usermodel.DataFormatter class, and it works, but it does not work when the the value is 12,34 and type of cell is Number defined in Excel file itself.
If you are validating the numbers, I would suggest that you might have more luck converting your validation string into a number to compare with the value in the cell. There is no information stored in the spreadsheet about the decimal/thousands separator. That is based on the locale set in the application or OS and is display-only - it is not stored at all. So you will have to manually format the number as a String.
I'm using HSSF-POI for reading excel data. The problem is I have values in a cell that look like a number but really are strings. If I look at the format cell in Excel, it says the type is "text". Still the HSSF Cell thinks it's numeric. How can I get the value as a string?
If I try to use cell.getRichStringValue, I get exception; if cell.toString, it's not the exact same value as in Excel sheet.
Edit: until this gets resolved, I'll use
new BigDecimal(cell.getNumericCellValue()).toString()
The class you're looking for in POI is DataFormatter
When Excel writes the file, some cells are stored as literal Strings, while others are stored as numbers. For the latter, a floating point value representing the cell is stored in the file, so when you ask POI for the value of the cell that's what it actually has.
Sometimes though, especially when doing Text Extraction (but not always), you want to make the cell value look like it does in Excel. It isn't always possible to get that exactly in a String (non full space padding for example), but the DataFormatter class will get you close.
If you're after a String of the cell, looking much as you had it looking in Excel, just do:
// Create a formatter, do this once
DataFormatter formatter = new DataFormatter(Locale.US);
.....
for(Cell cell : row) {
CellReference ref = new CellReference(cell);
// eg "The value of B12 is 12.4%"
System.out.println("The value of " + ref.formatAsString() + " is " + formatter.formatCellValue(cell));
}
The formatter will return String cells as-is, and for Numeric cells will apply the formatting rules on the style to the number of the cell
If the documents you are parsing are always in a specific layout, you can change the cell type to "string" on the fly and then retrieve the value. For example, if column 2 should always be string data, set its cell type to string and then read it with the string-type get methods.
cell.setCellType(Cell.CELL_TYPE_STRING);
In my testing, changing the cell type did not modify the contents of the cell, but did allow it to be retrieved with either of the following approaches:
cell.getStringCellValue();
cell.getRichStringCellValue().getString();
Without an example of a value that is not converting properly, it is difficult to know if this will behave any differently than the cell.toString() approach you described in the description.
You mean HSSF-POI says
cell.getCellType() == Cell.CELL_TYPE_NUMERIC
NOT
Cell.CELL_TYPE_STRING as it should be?
I would think it's a bug in POI, but every cell contains a Variant, and Variant has a type. It's kind of hard to make a bug there, so instead I think Excel uses some extra data or heuristic to report the field as text. Usual MS way, alas.
P.S. You cannot use any getString() on a Variant containing numeric, as the binary representation of the Variant data depends on it's type, and trying to get a string from what is actually a number would result in garbage -- hence the exception.
This below code works fine to read any celltype but that cell should contain numeric value
new BigDecimal(cell.getNumericCellValue()));
e.g.
ase.setGss(new BigDecimal(hssfRow.getCell(3).getNumericCellValue()));
where variable gss is of BigDecimal type.
Excel will convert anything that looks like a number or date or time from a string. See MS Knowledge base article, which basically suggests to enter the number with an extra character that makes it a string.
You are probably dealing with an Excel problem. When you create the spreadsheet, the default cell type is Generic. With this type, Excel guesses the type based on the input and this type is saved with each cell.
When you later change the cell format to Text, you are just changing the default. Excel doesn't change every cell's type automatically. I haven't found a way to do this automatically.
To confirm this, you can go to Excel and retype one of the numbers and see if it's text in HSSF.
You can also look at the real cell type by using this function,
#Cell("type", A1)
A1 is the cell for the number. It shows "l" for text, "v" for numbers.
The problem with Excel is that the default format is generic. With this format Excel stores numbers entered in the cell as numeric. You have to change the format to text before entering the values. Reentering the values after changing the format will also work.
That will lead to little green triangles in the left upper corner of the cells if the content looks like a number to Excel. If this is the case the value is really stored as text.
With new BigDecimal(cell.getNumericCellValue()).toString() you will still have a lot of problems. For example if you have identifying numbers (e.g. part numbers or classification numbers) you probably have cases that have leading zeros which will be a problem with the getNumericCellValue() approach.
I try to thoroughly explain how to correctly create the Excel to the party creating the files I have to handle with POI. If the files are uploaded by end users I even have created a validation program to check for expected cell types if I know the columns in advance. As a by-product you can also check various other things of the supplied files (e.g. are the right columns provided or mandatory values).
"The problem is I have values in a cell that look like a number" => look like number when viewed in Excel?
"but really are strings" => what does that mean? How do you KNOW that they really are strings?
"If I look at the format cell" => what's "the format cell"???
'... in Excel, it says the type is "text"' => Please explain.
"Still the HSSF Cell thinks it's numeric." => do you mean that the_cell.getCellType() returns Cell.CELL_TYPE_NUMERIC?
"How can I get the value as a string?" => if it's NUMERIC, get the numeric value using the_cell.getNumericCellValue(), then format it as a string any way you want to.
"If I try to use cell.getRichStringValue, I get exception;" => so it's not a string.
"if cell.toString, it's not the exact same value as in Excel sheet." => so cell.toString() doesn't format it the way that Excel formats it.
Whatever heuristic Excel uses to determine type is irrelevant to you. It's the RESULT of that decision as stored in the file and revealed by getCellType() that matters.