Latex and Excel

LaTeX Tips

Work with Excel

Sometimes, it is convenient to analyze data in MS Excel, instead of Matlab. When you're doing so, you may encounter problems when you have to generate a figure and put it into your Latex code. The following tutorial gives you the detailed steps of doing it. Make sure that you have installed a PostScript printer. If not, please refer to "Installing PS printer".

After you finish data analysis, you may have some figure to show in a chart. Before you proceed to print out the figure as an EPS file, you have to configure the proper fonts for the chart. I like to use a uniform font for all axis labels and legends without auto-scale. You just need to double-click on the edge of the chart. That allows you to configure the overall fonts for the chart. In the tab of Format Chart Area, you may set "Font" to be "5" (input by hand) and deselect the "Auto-scale" option.

Next you need to further configure the sizes of the chart. That decides the actual size of the figure in the EPS file. With "Ctrl" pressed, you click on the chart. By doing that, you change the mode of the chart to graphic model. Then you can edit the chart as a whole graphic object.

Now you may right-click on the chart and choose "Format Object" from the popup menu,where you may set up the proper sizes for height and width. Usually, I set height to 1.63" and weight to 1.74" for two-figure in one-column. You may adjust the settings until the figure size fits into your Latex article.

Before printing, you need to setup the printing options for the chart. With the chart selected (otherwise, you configure the printing options for the whole sheet), you choose "Page Setup" from the file menu. There, you need to set "Orientation" (in the tab of "Page Property") to be "Portrait" (figure) and set "Printed Chart Size" (in the tab of "Chart property") to be "Custom". After the above steps, you will get something like this.

Finally you may continue to print your chart on the configured printer. Note: In the file name dialog, you may input the full path with the file name. Otherwise, the PS file usually is created under My Documents, or sometime it is under the same directory as the Excel file.

After you obtain the PS file, you need to further process it in GSView. Please refer to "Updating Bounding-box of PS Figures".

Update 02-17-2006