Erasing a graph sent to Excel using -putexcel-

[Ivica Rubil]

Dear all,

I have sent a graph (exported as PNG) to Excel using -putexcel-. Is there a way to erase it from Stata, that is, without opening the Excel document manually and erasing the graph?

Best,
Ivica Rubil

[Rich Goldstein]

you don't say whether you are trying to erase the entire file or just part of the file; if the entire file, see

h erase

since I don't have access to excel, I can't answer the other option if that is what you want

[Ivica Rubil]

I'm trying to erase just the graph, located in a specific cell of a specific sheet.

[Leonardo Guizzetti]

Interestingly I don't see such a function documented either in Mata's Excel class (-xl()-) nor in -putexcel- which leads me to think that functionality doesn't exist. The only workaround I can think of would be to regenerate the Excel sheet that contains that image, making sure to -replace- it so that the entire contents of the old sheet are erased.

[Ivica Rubil]

Leonardo Guizzetti, is it really possible to replace (rather than modify) just one sheet within a document? If I understand -putexcel- correctly, you can only replace the whole document. Right?

[Leonardo Guizzetti]

You may modify the workbook, but replace a single sheet. I believe you also need -open- or -modify- as an additional option for putexcel as well.

putexcel set filename , sheet(sheetname, replace)