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Add Excel Data to WordCruncher


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Why Use Excel?

Texts are more than just the combination of words on a page. Your text likely has additional information that would be useful for your text analyses. You can include this information by organizing your text into levels and by using attributes. While TXT files don't allow you to use levels or attributes, Excel does.

Levels

Any book you read can be separated into levels of text. That might look something like Level 1: Book Name, Level 2: Chapters, and Level 3: Paragraphs. If you have Twitter data, you could have four levels: username, year, month, and day.

Attributes

Attributes are pieces of metadata that contain additional information about your text. If we use Twitter data, we could include attributes such as the number of retweets, comments, and likes for each Tweet. When you include attributes, you can filter your WordCruncher searches by adding attribute bounds.

How to Add Excel Data to WordCruncher

1. Format Excel Columns

Organize your columns into three sections: Levels, Text, and Attributes. While only the Text column is absolutely required, you'll get more out of WordCruncher searches and analysis reports when you include levels and attributes.

Example of CSV with Tweet data


Level(s)

Organize your data by levels. You can have a maximum of 10 level columns. Format the header like this, making sure to include the colon: Level: ***.

Text

To the right of your Level columns, add the text column. Format the header like this, making sure you exclude spaces after the word Text: Text.

Attribute(s)

To the right of your Text column, add attribute columns. You can add a maximum of 14 attribute columns. Format the header like this, making sure to include the colon: Attribute: ***

Missing Data

Avoid leaving cells blank, if possible. Make sure not to leave cells in the Text column blank. If there are empty Level cells, you may have errors.

2. Sort Data

In a book, you wouldn't place Chapter 2 before Chapter 1. Make sure to sort your levels properly.

Example of good and bad sorted data

Use Excel to Sort Data

  1. Select the entire table.
  2. Open the Data tab and select the Sort icon.
  3. Sort your first level column by A to Z or Smallest to Largest.
    Note: Sometimes, you might not want to sort your data A to Z or smallest to largest. In the above example, sorting the Months column A-Z would sort December before November.
  4. If you have more than one level column, click the Add Level button and add each column in order.
  5. Click OK.

3. Save as CSV

Save your Excel sheet as a CSV file.

4. Convert CSV to ETAX

Use the CSV to ETAX converter to convert your file.

Drag & Drop CSV

Download

Or Upload CSV

Waiting to Open File

5. Convert ETAX to ETBU

Open the WordCruncher Indexer to convert your ETAX to an ETBU file. Learn more about the Indexer here.

Errors

If there are errors, check your CSV column headers for typos. Double check that you have colons in the correct places. If you are still having problems, send us an email at wordcruncher@byu.edu with a description of the issue and the CSV file attached. We will do our best to help you out.

6. Open ETBU in WordCruncher

  1. Go to file > Open Book.
  2. Select WordCruncher User Library.
  3. Go to Options > Add Book.
  4. Select the ETBU. Click Open.
  5. Change the book description, if desired.
  6. Click OK.