Uploading data into PowerApps

[Scobie]

Hello,

Is there any way to allow the user to upload a xcel or csv file through a button click or something similar to have that data extracted and written to a SharePoint List? 

I have a couple of Idea's, I was just wondering if anyone has a good way of accomplishing this.

Thank you for your help in advance,

Scobie

[Anonymous]

Yes, you can upload data from Excel directly by adding a data source:

[Scobie]

Hi @Anonymous,

Yes I know that but is there someway for the user to do upload an xcel or csv file?

[Anonymous]

Sorry, I missed the word "User". 🙂

If the file is in the user's OneDrive for Business (or personal) account, you can load from that by using the OneDrive for (Business/Personal) data source specifying the Excel file and the table within it.  I believe this is also supported for Box, DropBox, and maybe some of the others (just not Sharepoint as an Excel file)

Information must in a table format - can't be any arbitrary Excel file currently.

Unfortunately it can't be an Excel file on a Sharepoint - not directly anyways in this manner.  

You can also have the PowerApps call into Microsoft Flow (if you have it) and allow it to grab the Excel file or CSVs from one of its connectors, which does open up more possibilities.  

 And from within sharepoint you can also load an Excel into a Sharepoint list, and then PowerApps can access the list.

[Scobie]

Hi @Anonymous,

No problem, Yes so far those were my two idea's (although I'm not sure how to do them).

I was interested in connecting to One Drive to extract the data but some work needs done on the users end to format the table in xcel (I would like to avoid that if possible). I was also not sure if the OneDrive connector would work the same with multiple xcel files being the same data layout or if I had to combine all that data into one xcel file.

I do already make use of a flow and would be interested to make use that (especially if I can avoid formating the xcel sheet or get to the data source without the user having to do anything). So if flow could interact with my data source and extract the data or if I can get PowerApps to let the user upload or maybe attach the xcel file in the app and then run a flow to extract the data (I know how the xcel will always be layed out I just want to take as much manual work out for the user).

Thanks for your help.

[v-xida-msft]

Hi @Scobie,

Could you please share a bit more about your scenario?

Do you want the user to upload a Excel or CSV file through a button click within your app?

Further, do you want the user to upload a Excel or CSV file into your app without formatting the data as a table?

I agree with @Anonymous's thought almost. More details about connecting to Excel file from PowerApps, please check the following article:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powerapps/maker/canvas-apps/connections/connection-excel

Please make sure the data of the Excel file has been formatted as a table. If the data of your Excel file has not been formatted as a table, you could not connect to it (Excel file/Excel table) from your app.

Currently, you could connect to multiple Excel tables within one Excel file from your app once time, if you want to connect to multiple Excel tables in different Excel files once time, I afraid that there is no way to achieve your needs in PowerApps currently.

Best regards,

Kris

[Scobie]

Hi @v-xida-msft,

Thanks for your response. I wanted to find out more about how I could deal with the user adding new data into my application through Excel. Since then, I have found a solution that works for me. I am making use of Power BI and SharePoint in my soltuion to have the user simply upload their excel files into SharePoint and sorting it out in Power BI.

If there was an easier way for a button in the PowerApp that could trigger a flow and pops up a window for the user to drag a file into woulf be nice but I don't think that is possible.

Thank you for your help,

Scobie

[Anonymous]

You mentioned that if you wanted to have multiple Excel files that this wasn't possible.  While I haven't tried it - couldn't you just create multiple data sources, each connected to the separate Excel file per OneDrive connection?  Or does PowerApps only allow on instance.

[Scobie]

Hi @Anonymous,

I'm not sure what you mean but that dosn't sound like it can be automated and would be a manual process. Now I have logic in Power BI that filters through every Excel file put into that list to avoid duplicate rows. So right now for this data I'm using SharePoint and Power BI and I will be getting that data back into PowerApps through the PowerBIIntegration.

Thanks,

Scobie

[Anonymous]

@Scobie, sorry I missed that you were looking to dynamically load different Excel files - not just simply connect to two or more directly (separate instance of the Excel datasource for each).  I went back and reread your message and that makes sense now.

May be a way to do that by calling a Flow and passing it the name of the file though.