SYLK to XLSX — a statement ledger for an archive nobody opens anymore
An archive of .slk files, and a client who wants them in a modern workbook. Because SYLK is a list of statements rather than a grid, the useful description of this transfer is a ledger: some statements produce cells, and several produce nothing at all. The new workbook then adds its own defaults, which is where the difference in appearance comes from.
Cell formatting, colours, column widths and merged ranges are dropped; only stored values survive.
Processed on your device. Files aren’t sent anywhere.
Which statements produce data
Only statements that carry values end up as cells.
| Statement | Produces | In the workbook |
|---|---|---|
| CELL | a value at a position | a cell |
| ID | file identification | nothing |
| COL | column description | nothing |
| STYLE | presentation | nothing |
| DIST | a distance | nothing |
Which statements produce nothing
Presentation statements are parsed so the file can be understood, then dropped.
- A bold header arrives as ordinary text.
- A column-width statement arrives as a default-width column.
- A distance statement has no counterpart in a workbook.
- Nothing is recalculated: stored values are copied.
What the new workbook adds
The output is not an empty shell — it is a workbook with its own defaults. Cells exist, positions come from the statement addresses, sheet names are cleaned of characters a spreadsheet cannot use and shortened to the format's limit, and the file keeps the source name. Presentation comes from the workbook, not from the archive.
A branch code is not a quantity
A branch code such as 0017 and a quantity of 17 may refer to entirely different things, despite sharing digits. Decide which columns are identifiers before applying number formatting or automatic cleanup to the rebuilt workbook. If the source already lost the zeros, this converter cannot infer how many to put back.
- Compare one identifier against the old application or a trusted reference.
- Check the corresponding downloaded cell before changing its format.
- Apply numeric operations only to columns whose meaning calls for them.
Questions
Does the original styling carry over?
Do column widths survive?
How many sheets does the workbook get?
Are values typed in the workbook?
Encoding on the way in
SYLK stores bytes under a single-byte codepage, and the reader decodes the file as UTF-8. There is no codepage metadata in the file, so accented characters can arrive changed. Descriptions and names are the fields worth comparing against the original.
Checking the converted workbook
Verify positions rather than appearance, since appearance was never part of the transfer.
- Convert the .slk file and download the workbook.
- Open the workbook and read the first row.
- Compare the row count with the cells you expected.
- Check that columns line up where statements addressed them.
- Add a header row if the archive stored data without one.