When attempting to read Excel files into SAS, you can encounter the following error:

ERROR: Connect: External table is not in the expected format.
ERROR: Error in the LIBNAME statement.

This can have several causes including the following:

• The file is not actually an XLS or XLSX file but is really a text file, XML, or HTML file with an XLS or XLSX extension on it.
• The file has a corrupt index structure leading to the worksheet.

To solve the problem do one of the following depending on the issue:

• Open the file in Excel and resave it.
• Copy the contents of the worksheet to a new workbook and then import the new workbook.
• The ACE drivers in Office 2010 can sometimes read the corrupted structure in the file when Office 2003 or Office 2007 cannot. If you have Office 2010 you can try to use those drivers.

Operating System and Release Information

Product Family	Product	System	SAS Release
			Reported	Fixed*
SAS System	SAS/ACCESS Interface to PC Files	Microsoft® Windows® for x64	9.2 TS2M0
		Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition	9.2 TS2M0
		Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition	9.2 TS2M0
		Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition	9.2 TS2M0
		Microsoft Windows XP Professional	9.2 TS2M0
		Windows Vista	9.2 TS2M0

* For software releases that are not yet generally available, the Fixed Release is the software release in which the problem is planned to be fixed.

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"External table not in expected format" errors can occur when attempting to read corrupted files or XML files with an XLS or XLSX extension into SAS.

Type:	Usage Note
Priority:
Topic:	Data Management ==> Data Sources ==> External Databases ==> MS Excel

Date Modified:	2010-12-20 15:20:56
Date Created:	2010-07-02 10:20:55