ClosedXML Adding Data to Existing Table

Question

With ClosedXML I am trying to add data to an existing Excel Sheet In an Existing Table. The easy thing to do is to add a table to an excel sheet below is a quick example of how to do that. What I don't understand is if you already have a Table there that is empty how can you just add to the existing table?

// Add a DataTable as a worksheet
            wb.Worksheets.Add(dataTable);

Answer 1

I don't know how this question isn't clear to people. If there is an existing Table (created in Excel by going to "Insert -> Table") and you open an Excel document using ClosedXML, adding data to the next row does not automatically expand the Table.

You can expand it prior to adding the data as such:

IXLTables tsTables = thisSheet.Tables;
IXLTable firstTable = tsTables.FirstOrDefault();
if (firstTable != null)
    firstTable.InsertRowsBelow(1);

Answer 2

I had a similar requirement, where I needed to insert data into an existing Table, which had a number of data validations / comments / formula built in.

I found that the easiest solution (for me) was to use the Table's ReplaceData call. This is particularly useful if you provide a name for your Table in the Excel worksheet, as that way you can get a reference to the table directly from the workbook, ie:

var candidateTable = workbook.Table("Candidates");  
candidateTable.ReplaceData(candidateData, propagateExtraColumns: true);

Note that the key to getting this to work properly is to set the propogateExtraColumns parameter - this will ensure any formula / etc you have set will automatically be copied to any new rows that are created.

FYI - you can set the Excel Table's name by selecting your table in the worksheet, clicking the Design tab, and then entering a table name: