export delphi stringgrid to excel - delphi

Question

I'm trying to export data from a stringgrid in delphi 7 to microsoft excel. I have been using this code to do it:
objExcel := TExcelApplication.Create(nil);
objExcel.Visible[LOCALE_USER_DEFAULT] := true;
objWB := objExcel.workbooks.add(null,LOCALE_USER_DEFAULT);
lineNumber := 1;
for i:=1 to stringgrid1.rowcount-1 do begin
for j:=0 to stringgrid1.ColCount-1 do begin
objWB.Worksheets.Application.Cells.Item[i+lineNumber,j+1] := ''''+stringgrid1.Cells[j,i];
end;
end;
but when the data is big, it takes a very long time to finish. is there other faster way to export data from delphi 7 stringgrid to excel?

Answer 1

The quickest way is to use an array of Variant,and just pass the entire array to Excel:
uses OleAuto;
var
xls, wb, Range: OLEVariant;
arrData: Variant;
RowCount, ColCount, i, j: Integer;
begin
{create variant array where we'll copy our data}
RowCount := StringGrid1.RowCount;
ColCount := StringGrid1.ColCount;
arrData := VarArrayCreate([1, RowCount, 1, ColCount], varVariant);
{fill array}
for i := 1 to RowCount do
for j := 1 to ColCount do
arrData[i, j] := StringGrid1.Cells[j-1, i-1];
{initialize an instance of Excel}
xls := CreateOLEObject('Excel.Application');
{create workbook}
wb := xls.Workbooks.Add;
{retrieve a range where data must be placed}
Range := wb.WorkSheets[1].Range[wb.WorkSheets[1].Cells[1, 1],
wb.WorkSheets[1].Cells[RowCount, ColCount]];
{copy data from allocated variant array}
Range.Value := arrData;
{show Excel with our data}
xls.Visible := True;
end;

Answer 2

The problem is that you are calling the Excel object for every cell; this is a slow operation at the best of times, so doing this for a large number of cells is going to take a long time. I had a case of this not so long ago: 4000 rows with 9 columns took about 44 seconds to transfer to Excel.
My current solution involves creating a csv file then importing that csv into Excel.
const
fn = 'c:\windows\temp\csv.csv';
var
csv: tstringlist;
row, col: integer;
s: string;
begin
csv:= tstringlist.create;
for row:= 1 to stringgrid1.rowcount do
begin
s:= '';
for col:= 0 to stringgrid1.ColCount-1 do
s:= s + stringgrid1.Cells[col, row-1] + ',';
csv.add (s)
end;
csv.savetofile (fn);
csv.free;
objExcel := TExcelApplication.Create(nil);
objExcel.workbooks.open (fn);
deletefile (fn);
end;
Another way comes from Mike Shkolnik which I am quoting as is:
var
xls, wb, Range: OLEVariant;
arrData: Variant;
begin
{create variant array where we'll copy our data}
arrData := VarArrayCreate([1, yourStringGrid.RowCount, 1, yourStringGrid.ColCount], varVariant);
{fill array}
for i := 1 to yourStringGrid.RowCount do
for j := 1 to yourStringGrid.ColCount do
arrData[i, j] := yourStringGrid.Cells[j-1, i-1];
{initialize an instance of Excel}
xls := CreateOLEObject('Excel.Application');
{create workbook}
wb := xls.Workbooks.Add;
{retrieve a range where data must be placed}
Range := wb.WorkSheets[1].Range[wb.WorkSheets[1].Cells[1, 1],
wb.WorkSheets[1].Cells[yourStringGrid.RowCount, yourStringGrid.ColCount]];
{copy data from allocated variant array}
Range.Value := arrData;
{show Excel with our data}
xls.Visible := True;
end;
I suggest that you try both methods and see which is faster for your purposes.

Answer 3

procedure WriteToExcel();
var
txt : TextFile;
Str : string;
i : integer;
begin
try
SaveDialog1.FileName := 'excelFile('+FormatDateTime('yyyy-dd-mm hh-nn-ss' ,(Now))+')';
if SaveDialog1.Execute then
begin
AssignFile(txt, SaveDialog1.FileName+'.csv');
try
if FileExists(SaveDialog1.FileName) then
Append(txt)
else
ReWrite(txt);
Str := 'title1, title2, title3, title4, title5';
WriteLn(txt, Str);
ShowQuery.First();
for i:=1 to StringGrid1.RowCount do
begin
Str := StringGrid1.Cols[i][1] + ',';
Str := Str + StringGrid1.Cols[i][2] + ',';
Str := Str + StringGrid1.Cols[i][3] + ',';
Str := Str + StringGrid1.Cols[i][4] + ',';
Str := Str + StringGrid1.Cols[i][5];
WriteLn(txt, Str);
end;
finally
CloseFile(txt);
end;
end;
except
end;
end;