Don't use eclipse to edit Excel files. Use Excel. I've never managed to make this OLE editor works well (but it is a long long time I did not retry, although I don't think there is any major evolution of this editor since then) . You can instruct Eclipse to use Excel to edit your .xls files (see configuration of File Types in Window>Preferences), or rigth-click + "open with system editor". The only thing to remember is to refresh your project if the Excel file is in a source folder. But the OLE Excel Eclipse editor is not a part of drools plugin (not sure your question should be here). You can find dozen of OLE editor for Eclipse on the net, if you really want to charge you with problems ... ----- Mail original ----- De: "Schlüter Dr. Andreas" <Andreas.Schlueter(a)Cirquent.de&gt; À: rules-users(a)lists.jboss.org Envoyé: Mardi 8 Novembre 2011 19:43:27 Objet: [rules-users] Issues with Eclipse Excel Plugin for Drools Decision Tables Hi all, I am trying out Drools with JBoss Tooling in Eclipse. Actually, much of it does not work for me, but since there were not many complaints about that, I think it must be due to my missing experience. But now I have a couple of things that seem like bugs to me. (BTW, I mainly use Eclipse 3.7, but I also installed 3.6 to see whether anything is better with that - which generally it isn't. I upgraded Jboss tools to one of the newest nightly builds which I do not like, but only that solved the issue that the rules language dialects could not be found. I am using drools 5.2.0) I gave up on the Audit trail which always said "The selected audit log is empty..." (but it isn't and this should have been resolved two years ago according to some mails, but I simply avoid using that view). What bothers me most is that the Excel Plugin shows really erratic behavior in my Eclipse (both versions of eclipse). It opens the Excel file once (I converted to Excel 2003 (*.xls) from my newer version), but on the second time it says "Cannot create the in-place editor Reason: This is probably because there is no OLE editor registered against the type of file you were trying to access" Details say: File does not exist, is not accessible to user or does not have the correct format. result=-2147287008.) Sometimes later on it will work again, sometimes it won't and Excel complains about another Application needing to complete its OLE requests (until I shut it down using task manager since there is no alternative since it does not accept any input anymore). Sometimes even saving changes fails, leaving a corrupt file. Is that common behavior that others experience as well or is it just a local configuration issue? (Usually, I have no issues with my installation and I am not aware of configuring anything apart from using the Eclipse update sites.) Thanks in advance for any hints, Andreas _______________________________________________ rules-users mailing list rules-users(a)lists.jboss.org https://lists.jboss.org/mailman/listinfo/rules-users

Actually, your proposal does not work as expected: While Eclipse is open, it locks the file. If I edit it with Excel, be it directly from the OS or via configuration of the filetype, I therefore cannot save it. So it is like "change the excel file""->startup eclipse ->click refresh -> get compilation Error -> shutdown eclipse -> correct error in excel -> startup eclipse -> click refresh ->... Is this really the way it is supposed to work? Is anybody at all using the Excel spreadsheet feature in a real application? How do they do it? I am using OOTB Eclipse, Drools, etc., and this is the first effect that I receive. How can that be the case if people are using this? Probably I need a commercial training course to start using the Eclipse Drools editors, does anyone have a recommendation where to get this? (Or is it just an Eclipse training course?) Thanks again, Andreas -- View this message in context: http://drools.46999.n3.nabble.com/Issues-with-Eclipse-Excel-Plugin-for-Dr... Sent from the Drools: User forum mailing list archive at Nabble.com.

Hi all Thanks again. Based on the feedback from this list and own investigation I tracked down my issues with using Excel Decision Tables Via Eclipse. It seems to be in fact a Drools tooling issue, namely related to the Drools Builder Component This tool is on the one hand very convenient to do interactive debugging of a decision table (initial development, before end users fill it the single lines of the sheet), since you get direct feedback on errors in the Project Build and even can jump into the excel sheet at the right place. On the other hand, it has the bug I mentioned: It opens the file but does not close it, so that a subsequent edit of the file in Excel only gets a read-only copy. If I turn it off, the error disappears (but no compilation happens), if I turn it on it is there back again. It seems to be a bug in the drools builder, but I do not know whether I can create an issue there. Regards, Andreas -- View this message in context: http://drools.46999.n3.nabble.com/Issues-with-Eclipse-Excel-Plugin-for-Dr... Sent from the Drools: User forum mailing list archive at Nabble.com.