FAQ: Reporting a bug in Spreadsheet::ParseExcel

[jmcnamara]

If you are reporting a bug in Spreadsheet::ParseExcel here are some
pointers

1) State the issues as clearly and as concisely as possible. A simple
program or Excel test file (see below) will often explain the issue
better than a lot of text.

2) Provide information on your system, version of perl and module
versions. The following program will generate everything that is
required. Put this information in your bug report.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

print "\n Perl version : $]";
print "\n OS name : $^O";
print "\n Module versions: (not all are required)\n";

my @modules = qw(
Spreadsheet::ParseExcel
Scalar::Util
Unicode::Map
Spreadsheet::WriteExcel
Parse::RecDescent
File::Temp
OLE::Storage_Lite
IO::Stringy
);

for my $module (@modules) {
my $version;
eval "require $module";

if (not $@) {
$version = $module->VERSION;
$version = '(unknown)' if not defined $version;
}
else {
$version = '(not installed)';
}

printf "%21s%-24s\t%s\n", "", $module, $version;
}

__END__

3) Upgrade to the latest version of Spreadsheet::ParseExcel (or at
least test on a system with an upgraded version). The issue you are
reporting may already have been fixed.

4) Create a small example program that demonstrates your problem. The
program should be as small as possible. A few lines of codes are worth
tens of lines of text when trying to describe a bug.

5) Supply an Excel file that demonstrates the problem. This is very
important. If the file is big, or contains confidential information,
try to reduce it down to the smallest Excel file that represents the
issue. If you don't wish to post a file here then send it to me
directly: jmcn...@cpan.org

6) Say if the test file was created by Excel, OpenOffice, Gnumeric or
something else. Say which version of that application you used.

John.
--

[Pankaj]

The program you may be having.

The system output is as below:

D:\Perl\bin\search tool>perl testa.pl
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdb79 at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdbb1 at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xd83e at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdff8 at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdbff at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdd98 at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xd9bf at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdcd7 at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdde6 at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdabe at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdb71 at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xd912 at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdab0 at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
Unicode character 0xfdde is illegal at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/
ParseExcel/FmtDefault.pm
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdc77 at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
substr outside of string at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel.pm
line 1015.
Use of uninitialized value in length at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/
ParseExcel.pm line 1951.
Use of uninitialized value $sTxt in unpack at D:/Perl/site/lib/
Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/FmtDefa
substr outside of string at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel.pm
line 1020.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdeec at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
UTF-16 surrogate 0xdd7e at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel/
FmtDefault.pm line 81.
substr outside of string at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel.pm
line 1196.
Use of uninitialized value in unpack at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/
ParseExcel.pm line 1196.
substr outside of string at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/ParseExcel.pm
line 1196.
Use of uninitialized value in unpack at D:/Perl/site/lib/Spreadsheet/
ParseExcel.pm line 1196.
Out of memory!



The system information is as below :

Perl version : 5.010000
OS name : MSWin32

Module versions: (not all are required)

Spreadsheet::ParseExcel 0.49
Scalar::Util 1.19
Unicode::Map (not installed)
Spreadsheet::WriteExcel (not installed)
Parse::RecDescent (not installed)
File::Temp 0.18
OLE::Storage_Lite 0.18
IO::Stringy 2.110

> directly: jmcnam...@cpan.org