How To Set Cell Width When Export Xlsx Files With Js Xlsx

When it comes to working with JavaScript and handling Excel files, setting cell width can be a crucial aspect that needs attention. In this article, we will guide you through the process of setting cell width when exporting XLSX files using js-xlsx library.

First things first, it's important to ensure that you have the js-xlsx library set up in your project. If you haven't already installed it, you can do so using npm or yarn:

npm install xlsx

yarn add xlsx

Once you have the library installed, you can start by creating your Excel workbook and worksheet. When setting the cell width, you need to specify the width in Excel's default unit of measurement, which is the width of a character.

To set the width of a specific cell or range of cells, you can use the `sheet` object provided by js-xlsx. Here's an example of how you can set the width of a cell:

const XLSX = require('xlsx');
const workbook = XLSX.utils.book_new();
const sheetName = 'Sheet1';
const worksheet = XLSX.utils.aoa_to_sheet([
  ['This', 'is', 'a', 'sample', 'row']
]);

// Set the width of the first column to 15 characters
worksheet["!cols"] = [{wpx: 15 * 256}];

XLSX.utils.book_append_sheet(workbook, worksheet, sheetName);

In the code snippet above, we are setting the width of the first column to accommodate 15 characters. The width is calculated in the default unit of measurement used by Excel.

If you want to set the width of multiple columns, you can adjust the `!cols` property accordingly. For example, to set the width of the first three columns, you can do the following:

worksheet["!cols"] = [
  {wpx: 15 * 256}, // First column
  {wpx: 20 * 256}, // Second column
  {wpx: 10 * 256}  // Third column
];

This code snippet sets the width of the first three columns to 15, 20, and 10 characters respectively.

It's worth mentioning that the unit of measurement for cell width in js-xlsx is based on the width of the '0' character in the default font. This means that the actual width of the cell may vary depending on the font being used in the Excel file.

By following these steps and customizing the cell width settings according to your requirements, you can effectively manage the layout of your Excel files generated using js-xlsx. Keep in mind that setting cell width is just one aspect of working with Excel files programmatically, and there are many other features and functionalities that you can explore to enhance your Excel exporting capabilities using JavaScript.