Dropped Displacements in Excel Output

Greetings Programs,

I have had an odd issue with C2 for awhile now so I thought I would ask if anyone else has it. It was in 2014 and is apparently still in 2016.

What is happening is that when I print out my results to excel from the static output processor that sometimes I get blank sheets. Normally I do Echo Input, Code Compliance, Restraint Summary Extended, and then all the relevant Displacement results. Everything seems to work fine EXCEPT sometimes I get either displacement pages that are just blank (I.E. the tab is labeled right, but there is nothing but a blank spreadsheet) or I get a labeled tab with a blank sheet and also a second tab that is labeled SheetX (where X is a number).

It seems to be very random. Sometimes I get all the data right. Other times I have 3 or 4 sheets blank. It also always seems to be the displacement sheets. It is very odd and I can't repeat the problem when I try. If I run the reports a second time it might work or other sheets might be blank.

Anyone else seeing something like this? I suspect an Excel problem more than C2, but I can't do much about Microsoft.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Duncan

You'll get a better answer from Intergraph's people, but I just wanna share my thoughts.

Here's a possible scenario of when you may end up with a blank sheet. Let's say when you export your output to Excel, you export a bunch of reports at the same time. So right after you press "View Report using MS Excel" button, you want to do something else with your computer while the Output Processor is busy preparing the Excel file for you. You're more likely to end up with an unexpectedly blank sheet if while the excel file is being prepared, you do something that uses your computer "clipboard", such as copying a file in Windows.

The problem is, Caesar also makes use of the clipboard when it transfers the data into the Excel worksheet (at least up to version 2014 which is all I have a the moment).

So, if you happen to do anything that makes changes to the clipboard the right before Caesar performs its Paste routine to the worksheet, you may end up with a blank sheet.

So try to leave the computer alone when Caesar is trying to export to Excel (or Word too I think).

If you're curious how I deduced that that's how Caesar transfers the data from the source into the worksheet, you may try this yourself:

1) Open Notepad, type something. Highlight the text.
2) Go to Caesar output processor, select a bunch of load cases, select maybe a Displacement report, and click that export to excel button.
3) Quickly go to your notepad. With the text already highlighted, press Ctrl+C to copy the text, repeatedly, as fast as you can (you can just hold Ctrl while tapping C repeatedly).
4) When Caesar is done exporting to Excel, if you're "lucky", you may end up with a worksheet or two with the text you copied from Notepad in it.

p/s: In my opinion, the transfer of data from Caesar to Excel should be done without touching the clipboard.

Thanks for the comments Faizal. Yeah, I found that out a while ago when I ended up with some C2 data in a word document. Now I try very hard not to do anything else even remotely connected to the clipboard while running C2.

And of course, I just now ran a report and the Input Echo sheet was blank. WTH? Perhaps I should look into submitting a bug report.

Thanks,
Duncan

This isn't a bug. We use the Clipboard for Excel export because any other way (on a network drive) is excruciatingly slow (to the point where it is unusable). So as stated above, don't use the Clipboard when exporting to Excel from c2.

Richard,

I figured that C2 used the clipboard for Excel export. I just don't understand why some pages show up blank. I have been very careful to just let the computer run the export and no do anything else with it when exporting. Could there be some issue in the interface between C2 and Excel? The report to Excel is one of the best features in C2 as I can then take the data and analyze it as I need.

So my questions is if the dropped data during export might be a bug in C2 or maybe a different computer issue perhaps with Excel itself.

Thanks,
Duncan

I haven't personally experienced blank pages in Excel. I'll concentrate all my reports to Excel and see if I can come up with something for you.