Using Microsoft Excel to Edit .dbf Tables

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Using Microsoft Excel to Edit .dbf Tables

CitectSCADA allows you to edit and save .dbf files (tables) used in CitectSCADA by opening them in Microsoft® Office Excel®.

Microsoft Office Excel® 2007 does not allow you to save files in .dbf format though you may open and edit them using the File > Open command. In order to overcome this limitation CitectSCADA includes an Add-In for Microsoft Excel called ProjectDBFAddIn. When this Add-In is loaded into Excel, it allows you to browse, open, edit and save CitectSCADA .dbf files in the correct format.

The ProjectDBFAddIn is an optional component included in the installation of CitectSCADA and is accessed from the installer. If you did not select installation of the Add-In during installation, you can install it at a later time by navigating to the ProjectDBFAddIn folder of your CitectSCADA installation and running the setup.exe in that folder.

Note: The installation of the projectDBFAddIn will only be available if a version of Microsoft Excel 2003 or later is detected by the installer on the target computer.

Compatibility

Though this Add-In is specifically designed for use with Microsoft Excel 2007, it is compatible with Microsoft Excel 2003.Currently Microsoft Office 2010 is not supported.

Integration with Microsoft Excel

When you open Microsoft Excel, an additional toolbar, or an additional tab, called project DBF Add-in is available depending on the version of Excel that you are using.

The fields and buttons on this toolbar allow you to choose:

The path to the master.dbf.
A CitectSCADA project from the master.dbf .
A .dbf file (table) belonging to the selected project.
Save changes made to a .dbf file (table).
Save changes without re-indexing the table, or save and re-index.
Save a dbf file with a different name.
Open a dbf file in any location

However, you can also open .dbf files using the File > Open command.

Protected Tables

The installation of the Add-In incorporates a list of tables that by default are excluded from being opened using the Add-In interface. This list is in a file called ExcludedProjectTables.xml and can be found in the Add-In installation directory.

These tables are system tables that are maintained by CitectSCADA, and it is recommended that these files are not edited externally in Microsoft Excel. To minimize the likelihood of additional tables being edited with Microsoft Excel you can add their names to the ExcludedProjectTables file using a text editor. You can also view the default list of tables using a text editor, or an XML compliant browser.

Read Only Tables

Projects which are read only, or contain read only tables, are displayed in the list of tables when selected from the Add-In buttons. If you try to open a read-only table (.dbf file) an alert (sometimes referred to as a "warning") message is displayed advising that the table is read only. You can still open and edit a read only table but you will not be able to save it.

A table could be read-only for the following reasons:

The project is read-only.
The table is open in the CitectSCADA Project Explorer.
The user trying to edit the file does not have read and/or write privileges.

If you attempt to save a read-only table an alert message is displayed advising that the table is read only.