Open a file from php script

[Tinus]

Hi

I need to open MS excell from my script.
I am not sure if the exec() will be able to do this,but I have tried without success.

Can you tell me how my php program can open a file like info.xls ?

[Atli]

Hey.

What do you mean by "open"? Do you want PHP to use the file or just pass it to the user?

If it's the former, then that's going to be a problem. The MS Office formats are proprietary; meaning that Microsoft alone can properly use them. Basically, you need to buy Office, and have it installed on the computer to be able to use the Office files.
Closest you will come to being able to read them is to use something like PHPExcel, which uses Microsoft's "standard" format (which they themselves fail to implement properly...)

If you just want to print it to the user, you can do that by simply setting the proper "content-type" header, and then passing the file through using readfile.

<?php
header('Content-type: application/vnd.ms-excel');
readfile('/path/to/file.xsl');
?>

[Tinus]

Thanks Atli

I want to start MS excell automatically from the php script.
It should do a few things and then open a specific excell workbook for the user.
The user will have MS Excell installed.
So the user will not need to open excell by himself.

I also have to do the same thing with a .exe file.