Knowledge Base

Importing from Microsoft Excel requires named range in Outlook

Article ID: 196743

Article Last Modified on 2/7/2007

APPLIES TO

Microsoft Office Outlook 2003
Microsoft Outlook 2002 Standard Edition
Microsoft Outlook 2000 Standard Edition

This article was previously published under Q196743

SYMPTOMS

When you try to import Calendar, Contact, or Task information from Microsoft Excel, you may receive one of the following messages:

An error has occurred in the Microsoft Excel translator while getting the contents of a file system.

The Microsoft Excel file <filepath\filename> has no named ranges. Use Microsoft Excel to name the range of the data you want to import.

-OR-

An ODBC error has occurred in Microsoft Excel translator while opening a file to build a field map. Microsoft ODBC Excel driver: too many fields defined.

CAUSE

The information you are trying to import is not contained within a named range in the Microsoft Excel file. Or, the range name used is the same as one of the column header names in the range.

RESOLUTION

To use a Microsoft Excel workbook to import information, cancel everything in Microsoft Outlook, and then open up the file in Excel. To do this, follow these steps:

On the File menu, click Save As.
In the Save as type box, click CSV (comma delimited), and then click Save.

You receive a message that resembles the following:

The selected file type does not support workbooks that contain multiple sheets.
Click OK to save only the active sheet.

You receive a message that resembles the following:

File name.csv may contain features that are not compatible with CSV (Comma delimited).
Click Yes, and then close the message. When you are asked whether you want to save the document, click No.

You have already saved the document. Therefore, you do not have to save it again.

Now you can import the .csv file into Outlook. To do this, follow these steps:

On the File menu, click Import and Export.
In the list, click Import from another program or file, and then click Next.
In the list, click Comma Separated Values (Windows), and then click Next.
Enter the name of the file that you want to import, click the option that you want, and then click Next.
Click the destination folder, and then click Next.

The destination folder is the Contacts folder or another folder that uses the IPM.contact form.

Under The following actions will be performed, make sure that the Import check box is selected. Then, click Map custom fields.
Drag the values from the source fields on the left to the corresponding Outlook destination fields on the right, and then click OK..
Click Finish, and then make sure that the contacts are imported the way that you want.

An alternative method is to define a named range in your Microsoft Excel worksheet. The name assigned to the range should not be the same as one of the column header names. To define a named range in Microsoft Excel, follow these steps:

In the Microsoft Excel worksheet, select the rows and columns that contain the information that you want to import.
On the Insert menu, point to Name, and then click Define.
In the Names In Workbook box, type a name (the name may not contain spaces nor should it be the same as one of the column header names) for the range that you specified, and then click Add.
Click OK, and on the File menu, click Save.
Save and quit the workbook.

MORE INFORMATION

Outlook uses the Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) method when importing information. When you import a file from Microsoft Excel, ODBC requires that the information be contained within a named range in the Microsoft Excel file. Using the range naming procedure above, the range name may default to a field name in the selected range. This name should be changed to a non-column header name.

An alternative method is to save the information from Excel using the comma separated value (CSV) format and then import the CSV file into Outlook. This method does not require using name ranges in Excel.

Keywords: kbprb KB196743

Microsoft KB Archive/196743

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