Graphics, Figures & Tables ⇒ Excel 2007 Add-in for easy PDF export of Charts and Tables

[U-Jean]

I made a small add-in in order to export charts and tables perfectly trimmed as PDFs for easy use with Latex graphicx package. I tested it with Office 2007 SP2 and Vista SP1.

Usage:
Just copy the Add-In into your Add-in directory of Office.
Activate the add-in in the excel option-menu.
Load any excel file select either a range (table) or a chart and press CTRL+SHIFT+P

Requirements:
Office2007 SP2 (Excel of course, and PowerPoint has to be installed, too)

The code is not protected and you are free to make any changes to it. I tried to comment every important step. If there are still questions just ask. If you make some nice improvements to the code please share it in this thread.

And please report if it worked for you.

UPDATE: I made the version XP-friendly and made it more fool-proof.

[U-Jean]

No one? Seriously? Am I in the wrong forum?
Somebody here must be using Latex in combination with Windows and Office 2007 and find this peace of code useful.
*bump*

[josephwright]

Ah, but there is the power of TikZ, pgfplots, booktabs and so on. Much better results than Office can every manage.

[localghost]

Of course you are not in the wrong place. Feedback will come if there is anyone who finds this tool useful. You should know that there are many tailor-made tools for processing scientific data for or within LaTeX like Joseph already mentioned. I personally would never use Excel or OOo Calc for data processing. If absolutely necessary, I'd prefer special software like SciDAVis or QtiPlot as free software or the commercial Origin to create charts, diagrams or plots. The packages Joseph listed ensure a maximum of consistency for LaTeX documents.


Best regards and welcome to the board
Thorsten

[josephwright]

I tend to use Excel plus SciDAVis (the later is good for curve fits, but for general calculations Excel is easier and more stable). QtiPlot is a pain on Windows: building the project is not easy, and there are no pre-built binaries that don't expire.

As an example, I've just had a paper accepted in a chemistry journal (http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/b912499c). The graphs (for example the one in the abstract, which everyone can see) are drawn using pgfplots, after doing some curve fitting in SciDAVis and a bit of number crunching in Excel. (The paper itself was written in Word, as my boss would otherwise be lost and the journal only accepts Word submissions anyway.)

[andreasonair]

Thanks to U-Jean!

I have been looking exactly for such an add-in.
It works for me (Office 2007 SP2, Windows 7 32 Bit).

One minor issue: When I generate the pdf of a chart with PowerPoint running, it works (pdf generated, powerpoint is closed), but at the end there is a runtime error (424, object required).

Andreas

[HypnosiS]

wow.

By chance I saw your add-in. This is excellent. I'm writing a thesis by using excel. Usually, I copy excel tables and paste as figures in excel and then open photofiltre and copy-save as .png form. Since my friend told me that .png saves in good quality.

However, your add-in shortened my process and the output is better then .png format.

Thank you very much.

burak

[msr]

Thanks for the effort!

However, this addin isnt working for me. Im using Excel 2007 with Win7. When I select the output file, the window which says "Publishing..." is flashing and any output is created.

Any suggestions?

[Faust]

I will try this too, however Im not a fan of Excel myself either.
In academic writing there are very few people that get happy from Excel graphs and tables, but its being used a lot regardless anyways.

I will give feedback.

[spiegboy]

sciDAVis is good. but i think it is not as powerful as origin.
any other useful free software to recommend?

Of course you are not in the wrong place. Feedback will come if there is anyone who finds this tool useful. You should know that there are many tailor-made tools for processing scientific data for or within LaTeX like Joseph already mentioned. I personally would never use Excel or OOo Calc for data processing. If absolutely necessary, I'd prefer special software like SciDAVis or QtiPlot as free software or the commercial Origin to create charts, diagrams or plots. The packages Joseph listed ensure a maximum of consistency for LaTeX documents.


Best regards and welcome to the board
Thorsten