How to Edit/Modify an existing Excel file in Java with Jexcel API

Question

I want to edit an existing Excel file with Java, to add some more data to an existing template excel file. So i used Jexcel for this purpose.

As suggested everywhere

Answer 1

I ran into this same issue and to solve the problem I updated to the latest version of jxl.jar via maven. After doing this there was a very long delay when it ran destinationWorkbook = Workbook.createWorkbook(outputFile, sourceWorkbook); but it completed successfully without errors.

Answer 2

Figured out the problem.

We have to close the input file before writing back (editing) the same file.

so to edit an existing Excel file with Jexcel

File inp = new File("H://"+file_name);
File out = new File("H://"+file_name);
Workbook existingWorkbook = Workbook.getWorkbook(inp);// This opens up a read-only copy of the workbook
WritableWorkbook copy = Workbook.createWorkbook(out,existingWorkbook); // This opens up a writable workbook so that we can edit the copy
//..........Some writes to excel workbook...........
// Now before writing & closing the copy, first close the existing one
existingWorkbook.close();    // Important: Close it before writing the copy with copy.write();
inp.close();
copy.write();
copy.close();