Moving from MS Excel to MySQL

Microsoft Excel is an excellent tool to record and track the data in handy representation enriched with powerful reporting capabilities. However, as organizations scale, it can become not only tedious to work with Excel spreadsheets but also becomes impractical due to security risks and larger datasets. A professional solution to storing data on an organizational level is with the use of modern database management systems.

When moving from Excel to a database, the most practical option is to use a MySQL database. There are a number of reasons for this. MySQL is feature-packed but also very simple to digest. It is not overly complex like PostgreSQL, which may be used at a later stage but initially, MySQL should be used to start off. It is also easy to learn, integrate, and setup.

If you already have a MySQL database setup, the migration can be as simple as exporting your spreadsheet as a CSV from Excel and importing it into the relevant table via a load data command. While this method is simple, it also has its issues. Firstly, the database and tables need to be created before loading any data onto the tables. Secondly, it offers less control over the end result and may result in a loss of data,

If you are not an experienced IT professional, you might choose to use commercial data migration software. For example, Excel to MySQL converter, a software tool offered by Intelligent Converters.It is an extremely user-friendly tool that can migrate Excel spreadsheets to MySQL database with a few clicks. The tool has many advantages:

• All versions of Microsoft Excel format are supported
• Easy-to-use wizard style graphical interface
• Can process large MS Excel spreadsheets
• Option to import comma separate (CSV) files into MySQL tables
• The application transforms data when it is necessary
• Can automate and schedule the conversion process
• Export data into MySQL script file for manual import using phpMyAdmin or a similar tool

Another highlight of the tool is intelligent type mapping. It can create columns of more types than offered by Excel. It scans each column for a data-type fit and accurately casts a column type accordingly. Following this way, the program is able to do the first conversion of the MS Excel data into text format, then it parses the data to cast the values into appropriate types like integers, doubles, or dates.

If you are just getting started with database and want to move away from clunky excel sheets, Excel to MySQL converter will be a great help