open and read data from files

Guys

I'm fairly new to C but I am aware of opening files with C. The only thing I've seen in books, however, is opening .dat and .txt files. Is it possible to open .xls files and read data? I haven't started code yet because I wanted to know if this was possible before I even got my feet wet.

Thanks for your time.

You can open any file you want, but the problem with xls files is that they are encoded. You have to know how to encode them and understand what they mean first. Unfortuanately, microsoft keeps this a secret and does not share.

- Sean

It's possible for your program to read any kind of data.

Is it possible to display it so the user can read it using your program?

That's up to you..

Wotsit, see the handly little search box? Put in three little letters and hit search. I'll even be so kind as to tell you what three letters to put in: xls.

Now that wasn't too hard, was it?

Quzah.

The answer is odbc. This allows you to read an excel sheet like a database.

The help files for odbc can be found here:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/de...his_manual.asp

An example of using ODBC to write to and read from excel files can now be found here under the name OdbcExcl:
http://www.john.findlay1.btinternet....e/database.htm

Quzah's reply is much much shorter than yours and just as credible and useful as yours. I don't see your logic.