Re: Importing from the AS/400 to Excel

At 12:17 09/17/1998 , Angie Wawrzaszek wrote:
>A user would like to import an AS/400 file into an excel spreadsheet and
>organize it there.  That part is fine, however is there a way to keep the
>changes the user makes to the look of the data in his spreadsheet (ie.
>titles, total fields) so that everytime he refreshes the data it does not
>go back to the original spreadsheet, which is just the file and its field
>names?  I do not know much about excel but this seems like it should be
>possible, or what a waste of time to even import your data?!  Any help is
>greatly appreciated.

If you're using an SQL query, the first time you "return data to excel" from 
MSQuery, you get a dialog that allows you to set query attributes. I always 
tell it not to save the password, don't refresh in the background, don't 
auto-format the columns, and usually, don't return field names. I then point 
the data at the second row in the spreadsheet instead of the first. Once the 
data is in the spreadsheet, I add my column headings, go into the window menu 
and lock the heading row(s) so that they don't scroll. Save it in the user's 
network excel directory, and send him/her a message explaining how to refresh. 
That's about it. It really cuts down on requests to slice and dice it a little 
differently. I've even showed a few users how to change the select filter using 
the graphical interface. They think it's great, and it's sure easy to do.


Pete Hall
peteh@inwave.com 
http://www.inwave.com/~peteh/

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