title: How to edit tab in .xls with Spreadsheet gem?
body: <p>I am trying to open an existing .xls file and overwrite the contents in one spreadsheet (tab).There are many tabs on the file and many have pivottables and other visual presentations.</p>
  
  <p>I have tried Spreadsheet and axlsx. Axlsx has great controls but overwrites the entire file including any other created tabs. Spreadsheet will open and edit a file but you have to copy the other tabs which will remove the excel formatting. </p>
  
  <p>Is there a way to use Ruby to add data to only one tab in a spreadsheet without changing content in the other tabs? </p>
  
  <p>Update: </p>
  
  <p>Here is what I am testing now using the Spreadsheet gem. I can open a spreadsheet that has multiple tabs where one tab contains a pivottable, another contains a chart, and another the raw data. They have to be saved out as a new doc otherwise you get a File Format is not Valid error. </p>
  
  <pre><code>   open_book = Spreadsheet.open('../data/exports/test_output_dashboard.xls') 
      puts "#{open_book.worksheet(0)}"
      puts "#{open_book.worksheet(1)}"
      puts "#{open_book.worksheet(2)}"
      open_book.write('../data/exports/test_output_dashboard_2.xls')
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>If I just open and resave the new document is fine, a working copy of the original. However, if I edit the tab with the raw data as in this code then when I open the file it is shown as needs to be 'repaired' and none of the tabs show the correct information. </p>
  
  <pre><code>open_book = Spreadsheet.open('../data/exports/test_output_dashboard.xls') 
  puts "#{open_book.worksheet(0)}"
  puts "#{open_book.worksheet(1)}"
  puts "#{open_book.worksheet(2)}"
  new_row_index = open_book.worksheet(1).last_row_index + 1
  open_book.worksheet(1).insert_row(new_row_index, row_2)
  open_book.write('../data/exports/test_output_dashboard_4.xls')
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Any suggestions for adding data to one tab of an excel doc while keeping the other tabs intact would be greatly appreciated. The solution can be any gem or could be any language or automatable tool. </p>
  
  <p>UPDATE: </p>
  
  <p>Here is an example Excel dashboard that I am using for testing. I am writing rows into the data tab. <a href="https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23226147/test_output_dashboard.xlsx" rel="nofollow">https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23226147/test_output_dashboard.xlsx</a></p>
  
  <p><strong>UPDATE:</strong> </p>
  
  <p>With RubyXL I can open and inspect the content of each tab but the saved doc cannot be opened by Excel.</p>
  
  <p>workbook = RubyXL::Parser.parse("../data/exports/test_output_dashboard.xlsx")
  puts "#{workbook.worksheets[0].inspect}"
  puts "#{workbook.worksheets[1].inspect}"
  puts "#{workbook.worksheets[2].inspect}"
  workbook.write("../data/exports/test_output_dashboard_5.xlsx")</p>