Opening the Excel application from Python
Question: I am using 'xlwt' to write into Excel files as part of my project in Python. I
also need to actually open the Excel spreadsheet for display and also close
it. I found a function:

    
    
    import webbrowser
    webbrowser.open('C:/Users/300231823/Desktop/GUI/simplenew4.xls')
    

This seems to open the .xls file. How do I close the file?

I am completely new to programming, and I started using Python 3 weeks ago.


Answer: 
    from win32com.client import Dispatch
    
    xl = Dispatch("Excel.Application")
    xl.Visible = True # otherwise excel is hidden
    
    # newest excel does not accept forward slash in path
    wb = xl.Workbooks.Open(r'C:\Users\300231823\Desktop\GUI\simplenew4.xls')
    wb.Close()
    xl.Quit()
    

The win32com module is part of
[pywin32](http://sourceforge.net/projects/pywin32/).

