Dear Folks,
Greetings !!
I request your guidance in resolving the "well known" excel upload problem using GUI_UPLOAD in ABAP. I understand that there are large number of threads dealing with the excel upload issue, however I have a psecific question to ask.
I have created an OData service to upload an excel file (Entity type = Media). For testing the same, I am uploading a test MS excel file in the GW_CLIENT using the 'Add File' button. The file gets uploaded but appears as junk characters in the request body. Please refere to the image attached herewith.
I debugged the 'Add File' button and understand that the SAP standard code uses method GUI_UPLOAD of the GUI frontend services class, with Filetype = 'BIN' (hardcoded) to upload the file. The BINARY data received after the GUI_UPLOAD is also correct since I tested this by downloading the same BINARY contents and this creates the same excel file after download. This means that the excel is read correctly by GUI_UPLOAD.
On more debugging and searching in the SCN forums, I stumbled upon an answer by Thomas Jung in a post (Re: Upload a file excel with web dynpro) stating that the characters uploaded are not JUNK but they are the Native Binary Excel Format which is a propriatery Microsoft format. Therefore when I try to convert the XSTRING of this binary to STRING, the contents are not the excel text contents, instead it is these junk characters.
So, my question is - Is there any way (FM, BAPI, custom code) in ABAP to convert the native binary excel format into readable text?
Any pointers are highly appreciated.
Thank you.
Regards,
Sud