How can Perl operate multiple worksheets in a Excel file? - perl

Question

I'm still learing Perl, and am trying to perform the following task -- and am miserably stuck.
Currently I have the following.
Open the necessary Excel file
Store Workbooks info under var $workbook1
Store Worksheets info under var $worksheets1
my $excel = Win32::OLE -> new("Excel.Application");
$excel->{Visible} = 0;
$excel->{DisplayAlerts}=0;
$excel->{SheetsInNewWorkbook} = 1;
my $workbook1 = $excel->Workbooks->Open($OutFileName);
my $worksheet1 = $workbook1->Worksheets(1);
I later take this info and have Perl to write in the cells of the Excel file (the necessary $Row and $Col are initialized accordingly).
$worksheet1->Cells($Row, $Col)->{'Value'} = $var1;
$worksheet1->Cells($Row, $Col+1)->{'Value'} = $var2;
$worksheet1->Cells($Row, $Col+2)->{'Value'} = $var3;
$worksheet1->Cells($Row, $Col+3)->{'Value'} = $var4;
So far this works fine.
What I intend to do is operate on multiple worksheets instead of just one.
Open the necessary Excel file
Store Workbooks info under var $workbook1
Store Wortsheets info under var(s) $worksheets1, $worksheets2, $worksheets3, $worksheets4, $worksheets5 (or store it into an array if it's possible?)
I have a total of 5 worksheets I need to operate on in the Excel file.
I'm trying to for loop the latter process (where I write in the cells) for each worksheet, but I'm trying to find an easier way to recall the $worksheet1, $worksheet2, ..., $worksheet5 variables. Cuz, for now without the proper array variable -- which I yet learned how to in Perl -- I need to do an if statement for each every for loop and write the according code, which is very ineffective.. Is there a way to perform this with an array or something else for the worksheet variable?
I'm more familiar with how Matlab works.. and here's what I would like Perl to do if it were a Matlab script with arrays.
for i = 1:num_worksheets
# write in worksheet[i] cell (j,k) with variable var1
end

Answer 1

I am not entirely sure I get what you mean, but I think what you want to do is not repeat code. At least that is how I understand your Matlab code.
You can put all the worksheets into one array in Perl like this.
my $worksheet1 = $workbook1->Worksheets(1);
my $worksheet2 = $workbook1->Worksheets(2);
my $worksheet3 = $workbook1->Worksheets(3);
Or shorter:
my #worksheets (
$workbook1->Worksheets(1),
$workbook1->Worksheets(2),
$workbook1->Worksheets(3),
);
Or even shorter:
my #worksheets = map { $workbook1->Worksheets($_) } 1 .. 3;
Then you can iterate that array. The $worksheet variables are all objects, and objects in Perl are references. That means that if you put them into an array, you are not making copies of the objects.
foreach my $sheet ( #worksheets ) {
$sheet->Cells($row, $col)->{'Value'} = $var1;
$sheet->Cells($row, $col + 1)->{'Value'} = $var2;
}
That code will write $var1 and $var2 into the $row/$col cells in all three worksheets 1, 2 and 3.
You don't even have to create an array. You can just supply a list of the workbooks if that's the only place where you use all of them together in that order.
foreach my $sheet ($worksheet1, $worksheet2, $worksheet3) {
$sheet->Cells($row, $col)->{'Value'} = $var1;
}