Course Web Site Development: Advanced FrontPage Components: Putting Microsoft Office Documents on the Web: Excel

Microsoft Excel documents can be easily translated into a usable HTML format.  This process, known as file type conversion, can be directly applied to your courseware.  For example, if you have data sets, tables or balance sheets already typed up in Excel, you may use the procedure outlined below to convert them to a web page document and offer them to your students directly off of your web site.  

There are two ways to put your Excel worksheets online.  The first is to create a static version of your material.  This type of file is inherently unchangeable, but is very useful for distributing information that does not need any degree of interactivity.  The major advantage of using this type of spreadsheet is that all users - no matter what browser they are using- may view this information.  To see a demonstration of this type of excel spreadsheet, click here.

The second way to distribute your Excel worksheets is to create an interactive version of your data.  This type of distribution is useful to provide demonstrations to your students so that they can actually interact with and affect the data.  Unfortunately, the technology used to implement this level of interactivity is proprietary, and thus will only work if you have Microsoft Office 2000 and Internet Explorer installed on your system.  If you have both of these components, click here to see an demonstration of this type of excel spreadsheet.

• To create a non-interactive web-based spreadsheet that is visible to ALL browsers, click here.
• To create an interactive web-based spreadsheet that is visible only to users running Internet Explorer and Microsoft Office 2000, click here.

Non-Interactive Excel Spreadsheets

1. Open up your spreadsheet in Microsoft Excel.
2. From the File menu choose Save as Web Page.  If Save as Web Page is not an option, choose Save as HTML.  If neither of these are an option, you need to have an additional module installed.  Please contact the Help Desk at campus extension 2660 to place a service call.  A window similar to the following will appear.
   
   
   
   
3. You may choose to publish the entire workbook (all sheets within the current workbook) or just the current worksheet.  If you choose to publish the entire book, click Entire Workbook.   To see a demonstration of an entire workbook being published to a web page, click here.   If you choose to publish just the current sheet, choose Republish:  Sheet.  Make sure that Add interactivity is not checked.
4. Type in file name for your sheet and save it somewhere on your computer.  Remember where you save your file, as you will need this location for the next step.
5. Open up FrontPage, and load up your website.
6. From the File menu choose Import.  The following window will appear.
   
   
   
   
7. Click the Add File button.  The following window will appear.
   
   
   
   
8. Find your file on your computer and click the Open button.  
9. If you are just publishing a single sheet, click the OK button.  If you are publishing your entire workbook, click the Add Folder button and go to the directory that holds the HTML version of your Excel file.  There should be a folder in this directory with the same name as your Excel file.  Click on this folder and click the OK button.   Click the OK button again.
10. Your file (as well as a file folder, if you are importing an entire workbook) will appear in the Folder List in FrontPage.  You may now treat this file like you would any other web page file with respects to creating Hyperlinks, etc.

     

Interactive Excel Spreadsheets

1. Open up your spreadsheet in Microsoft Excel.
2. From the File menu choose Save as Web Page.  If Save as Web Page is not an option, choose Save as HTML.  If neither of these are an option, you need to have an additional module installed.  Please contact the Help Desk at campus extension 2660 to place a service call.  A window similar to the following will appear.
   
   
   
   
3. Choose Republish:  Sheet.  Make sure that Add interactivity is checked.
4. Type in file name for your sheet and save it somewhere on your computer.  Remember where you save your file, as you will need this location for the next step.
5. Open up FrontPage, and load up your website.
6. From the File menu choose Import.  The following window will appear.
   
   
   
   
7. Click the Add File button.  The following window will appear.
   
   
   
   
8. Find your file on your computer and click the Open button.  
9. Click the OK button.
10. Your file will appear in the Folder List in FrontPage.  You may now treat this file like you would any other web page file with respects to creating Hyperlinks, etc.