You are here:
- Home
- Computing/Technology
- Microsoft Software
- Excel
- Turning a lengthy one-column sheet into a format suitable for a database
Excel/Turning a lengthy one-column sheet into a format suitable for a database
Advertisement
Question
I have three excel sheets that each have about 65,000 rows, and one column. They are a combination of about 2,400 files that contain information on agencies (name, address, contact, brief description etc etc). The information originated from a large text file containing each of the 2,400 entries one after the other vertically.
I want to create an access database out of this information. The first step, I guess, would be to format these pages so that a new agency comes up every X lines exactly. Then, I could use formulas to separate out the information into different columns. The sheets looks something like this (but with around 80 lines per entry):
Name
Address
Telephone
This is where there's
a description for each agency, and
some descriptions take up many lines
whereas others don't.
For starters, I would need to be able to make it so that all descriptions only take up one line. Each description is proceeded by "Program/Service Notes:" on the row above. Also, all of the information that I would need to merge into one row occurs on consecutive rows, whereas all the information that doesn't need merging is separated by an empty row.
Any guidance on how to proceed would be tremendous. Thank you!
Answer
Candidly and politely, if you stop to think about this for a minute I think you will realize that ANY useful advice I would give to get you started or to proceed would require a tremendous amount of typing. Simply saying just create an ACCESS db is something you have already thought of doing.
IF you want me to tell you how to setup the ACCESS db then again that is tremendous amount of typing too.
Not sure then what guidance I can give you without practically doing the whole project myself for you.
Related Articles
This topic answers questions related to Microsoft Excel spreadsheet (or workbook) stand-alone or Mircrosoft Office Excel including Excel 2003, Excel 2007, Office 2000, and Office XP. You can get Excel help on Excel formulas(or functions), Excell macros, charting in Excel, advanced features, and the general use of Excel. This does not provide a general Excel tutorial nor the basics of using a spreadsheet. It provides specific answers to using Microsoft Excel only. If you do not see your Excel question answered in this area then please ask an Excel question here
Answers by Expert:
- Nathan Head
- Chad Welch
- Philip Buckley
- Tushar Sakhalkar
- Bhaskar
- Amal
- Damon Ostrander
- Gyula Gulyas
- Stuart Resnick
- Bill Hermanson
- Bob Umlas
- Edward H. Mori
- Jessica L.
- Jan Karel Pieterse
- Aidan Heritage
- Tom Ogilvy
- Richard Roberts
- Richard Stephens
- Craig
- Adelaide carvalho
- Miguel Zapico
- JP
- Douglas M. Smith
- Richard Rost
- Ken Marron
- Victor Lan
- Bill
- Anne Troy
- Claire Blinman
Bill
Expertise
I can provide help with most all EXCEL questions and most all questions about writing EXCEL macros. I have been developing macros for about 10 years in EXCEL and have switched to it from Lotus 1-2-3 after about 10 years of writing macros in it. Typically, I will not write a macro for you unless it is very short because of all the details a macro has to know about to work every time all the time. Please understand that I do not know it all and will be the first to say so. As politely as possible, I don't write macros for people on this site who need one, want one, seem to imply that they need one, and/or seem to think I am expected to write one UNLESS they are very short, quick, and simple. 99% of all macros are more involved than what you think and rarely am I provided with enough specific and complete details to have the code work the first time and every time. This typically means too many follow-up emails, and subsequent macro changes due to lack of specific details, just to get those details so that the macro would work, all of which is on my own free time. The voice of experience from responding to many questions from people who ask me to write a macro for them from this site tells me this. I don't mean to come across as unhelpful but macros are usually very specific and without ALL of the specifics the macro I would write will not address all of your needs and the layout, location, formatting, conditions, etc. of your data and any related files the macro would have to work with. What seems like a simple task to you is almost always more involved than what you think to have the macro ALWAYS work in EVERY situation. If you have a macro you have already written and have a question about it then perhaps I could help with that. I am sure and hope you can and do understand.
©2009 About.com, a part of The New York Times Company. All rights reserved.