I am importing data from MS Excel spreadsheets into a php/mySQL application. Several different parties are supplying the spreadsheets and they are in formats ranging from Excel 4.0 to Excel 2007. The trouble is finding a technique to read ALL versions.
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Depending on the nature of your data and the parties that upload the excel files, you might want to consider having them save the data in .csv format. It will be much easier to parse on your end.
Assuming that isn't an option a quick google search turned up http://sourceforge.net/projects/phpexcelreader/ which might suit your needs.
The open-source ETL tool Talend (http://wwww.talend.com) will generate Java or Perl code and package such code with the necessary 3rd party libraries.
Talend should be able to handle all versions of Excel and output the result set in any format you require (including loading it directly into a database if need be).