This reference summarizes how Spread.Sheets handles Microsoft Excel files. When bringing an Excel file into Spread.Sheets (importing) and when saving Spread.Sheets files to an Excel format (exporting), not all of the content and features are preserved, mostly because of differences in the way Spread.Sheets and Microsoft handle certain features, but most of the data can be managed successfully. The intention of the import and export capability is to handle as much of the data and formatting of a spreadsheet as possible. For more information about import and export of Excel files, refer to these topics.
The information about Excel XLS files in these topics is based on BIFF8 (Binary Interchange File Format, version 8 from Microsoft) which is the file format for several versions of Microsoft Excel (such as Excel 97, Excel 2000, and Excel XP) and Excel XLSX (BIFF12 XML format in Excel 2007). Throughout this documentation, the shorthand name Excel is used for all the types of Excel files that are supported by Spread.Sheets.