SharePoint University

Hi there guys,

I am a newbie to sharepoint and have been tasked by my boss to create an excel or access 2003 file of all the items in a list in sharepoint 2003.

The Sharepoint is installed on the Windows Server 2003 edition OS and grants the rest of the workstation running XP access to it.

I have worked on it for close to a week now with nothing to show...

There are about 6000 items in the list with close to 2000 attachments. Using the built in "export to excel" function results in an excel file with no attachments. It is going to take me months to export the list and manually link up the attachments (after i figure how to download the attachments in the first place!).

I have done my duty and prowled the net to search for solutions, but mostly are for exporting to another sharepoint server or so, nothing much written for exporting to either access or excel 2003.

Please help this poor traumatised newbie..

 Thanks!

Han

Hello,

Your situation seems doable fairly easy, but I need to know more about your setup.

First question: How do you intend to export SharePoint attachments to your list? Do you want a column with the name/url of the file?

Second question: Why? Knowing this may help in understanding what you are trying to accomplish rather than suggesting a solution that might not even get yu where you're going. Do you need offline capabilities, and if so, how do you intend to synchronize? Are you looking to just dump all sharepoint data and loose the orignal?

.b

Hi there!

Let me begin with a thank you for your reply to my query. Really appreciate it.. For your queries, please see below:

How do you intend to export SharePoint attachments to your list? Do you want a column with the name/url of the file? :
Yes, i intend to have an excel file, and the attachments copied and stored in a known folder. Then have a URL in a column pointing to the file such that when the url is clicked, it opens up the attachment. Eventually, we are handing over the excel file and all the attachments in one folder and sending it to another party.

Why? Do you need offline capabilities, and if so, how do you intend to synchronize? Are you looking to just dump all sharepoint data and loose the orignal? : We are actually handing over this information to another vendor, so we are not concerned about synchronization. We need an offline copy of the information, hand it over to them and the job is done. So in a sense, we are dumping all sharepoint data but preferably not lose the original sharepoint information. More like a offline duplicate of the sharepoint list with attachments.

 Thanks again!!

Han

Hello,

Based on what you want to accomplish you will need a custom solution which will involve some development. There is no 'out of the box' way of doing exactly what you suggest, I'm afraid.

Good news is, if you've done some development before, you should have too many problems. What you will need to do is iterate through the list and build your Excel document through code.

Now, before I start dwelling into details, is this a viable option for you if I lay out the basic groundwork for you?

.b

 Hello furuknap,

 Yes, it would be a viable option for me to attempt some development.

 Looking forward to some groundwork advice from you. Thank you so much in advance

Han

 

Great, I'll write an article on this right now. sorry for the delay, I got a bit busy last night.

 I'll let you know through here when I have posted the article.

.b

I've posted an article describing some sample code that should get you started on creating your 'Export to Excel on steroids' on my blog:

http://furuknap.blogspot.com/2008/06/exporting-sharepoint-lists-to-excel.html

Please note the quirks on top. Let me know if this works out for you.

.b

 Hi furuknap,

Thank you  so much for your help.

 I will defiantely give this a try.

Thanks a lot again, really appreciate this.

Haninator
 

furuknap:

Do you want a column with the name/url of the file

How can you modify the export to get a link/url to the attachment? I have a list that has a combo of links to documents on another server and I need to add the same type of document links for attachments. Appreciate any help.