How to generate Excel using PhpSpreadsheet in CodeIgniter

In this post, I would like to show using of PhpSpreadsheet library within your CodeIgniter 3 project. PhpSpreadsheet is a pure PHP library for reading and writing spreadsheet files.

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Here are the steps to generate Excel in the CodeIgniter 3 application with PhpSpreadsheet:

Step 1: Download and install CodeIgniter.

Step 2: Run the below composer command to download phpspreadsheet the library from your project folder. It will create a new folder called “vendor” and it will download phpoffice/phpspreadsheet library into it.

$ composer require phpoffice/phpspreadsheet

Here is my the directory structure after installing phpoffice/phpspreadsheet

Step 3: Open application/config/config.php file and set your vendor directory path

 $config['composer_autoload'] = 'vendor/autoload.php';

Step 4: Use phpspreadsheet library inside in your controller, here is the sample:

<?php
defined('BASEPATH') OR exit('No direct script access allowed');

use PhpOffice\PhpSpreadsheet\Spreadsheet;
use PhpOffice\PhpSpreadsheet\Writer\Xlsx;

class Welcome extends CI_Controller {
    
	public function index()
	{       
		$spreadsheet = new Spreadsheet();
		$sheet = $spreadsheet->getActiveSheet();
		$sheet->setCellValue('A1', 'Hello World !');
		
		$writer = new Xlsx($spreadsheet);

		$filename = 'name-of-the-generated-file.xlsx';

		$writer->save($filename); // will create and save the file in the root of the project

	}

	public function download()
	{
		$spreadsheet = new Spreadsheet();
		$sheet = $spreadsheet->getActiveSheet();
		$sheet->setCellValue('A1', 'Hello World !');
		
		$writer = new Xlsx($spreadsheet);

		$filename = 'name-of-the-generated-file';

		header('Content-Type: application/vnd.ms-excel');
		header('Content-Disposition: attachment;filename="'. $filename .'.xlsx"'); 
		header('Cache-Control: max-age=0');
		
		$writer->save('php://output'); // download file 

	}
}

For more information, here is the official documentation page of – phpspreadsheet documentation