How to convert text to a table using comma as delimiter in a Word document

Syncfusion® Essential® DocIO is a .NET Word library used to create, read, edit, and convert Word documents programmatically without Microsoft Word or interop dependencies. Using this library, you can convert text to a table using comma as delimiter in a Word document using C#.

To achieve this, follow the steps below:

• Open the Word document and access the paragraphs you want to convert into a table.
• Concatenate the selected paragraph text with each paragraph separated by a line break.
• Split the combined text into rows by line breaks and columns by commas.
• Create a table based on the row and column count, filling each cell with the parsed text.
• Remove the original paragraphs from the document and insert the new table at the same location.

Steps to convert text to a table using comma as delimiter in a Word document:

1. Create a new .NET Core console application project.
2. Install the Syncfusion.DocIO.Net.Core NuGet package as a reference to your project from NuGet.org.
   
   

3. Include the following namespaces in Program.cs file
   C#

using Syncfusion.DocIO.DLS;
using Syncfusion.DocIO;
using Syncfusion.Drawing;

4. Use the following code example to convert text to a table using comma as delimiter in a Word document.
   C#

using (FileStream inputStream = new FileStream("Data/Input.docx", FileMode.Open, FileAccess.Read, FileShare.ReadWrite))
{
   // Open the input Word document.
   using (WordDocument document = new WordDocument(inputStream, FormatType.Docx))
   {
       // Access the body of the first section.
       WTextBody body = document.Sections[0].Body;
       // Retrieve the paragraphs that is need to be converted into a table.
       WParagraph para1 = body.Paragraphs[0];
       WParagraph para2 = body.Paragraphs[1];
       WParagraph para3 = body.Paragraphs[2];
       WParagraph para4 = body.Paragraphs[3];
       // Combine the text from the paragraphs, each separated by a new line.
       string text = para1.Text + "\r\n" + para2.Text + "\r\n" + para3.Text + "\r\n" + para4.Text;
       // Convert the combined text into a table.
       IWTable table = ConvertTextToTable(document, text);
       // Get the index of the first paragraph to insert the table at the correct position.
       int index = body.ChildEntities.IndexOf(para1);
       // Remove the selected paragraphs from the document.
       body.ChildEntities.Remove(para1);
       body.ChildEntities.Remove(para2);
       body.ChildEntities.Remove(para3);
       body.ChildEntities.Remove(para4);
       // Insert the newly created table at the location of the first paragraph.
       body.ChildEntities.Insert(index, table);
       // Save the modified document with the table inserted.
       using (FileStream outputStream = new FileStream("Output/Output.docx", FileMode.Create, FileAccess.Write))
       {
           document.Save(outputStream, FormatType.Docx);
       }
   }
}

5. Use the following helper method to convert the provided text into a table format with rows and columns.
   C#

/// <summary>
/// Converts the provided text into a table format with rows and columns.
/// </summary>
IWTable ConvertTextToTable(WordDocument document, string text)
{
   // Split the text into rows based on line breaks.
   string[] rows = text.Split(new string[] { "\r\n" }, StringSplitOptions.None);
   // Create a new table in the document.
   IWTable table = new WTable(document);
   // Determine the number of rows and columns based on the text structure.
   int rowCount = rows.Length;
   int colCount = rows[0].Split(new char[] { ',' }).Length;
   // Initialize the table with the appropriate number of rows and columns.
   table.ResetCells(rowCount, colCount);
   // Populate the table with the text by iterating through each row and column.
   for (int i = 0; i < rowCount; i++)
   {
       // Split the current row into columns using a comma as the delimiter.
       string[] columns = rows[i].Split(new char[] { ',' });
       for (int j = 0; j < colCount; j++)
       {
           // Add a paragraph to the cell and append the text.
           table[i, j].AddParagraph().AppendText(columns[j].Trim());
       }
   }
   // Set the table's border color to black.
   table.TableFormat.Borders.Color = Color.Black;
   // Set the table's border style to single line.
   table.TableFormat.Borders.BorderType = BorderStyle.Single;
   // Return the created table.
   return table;
}

You can download a complete working sample to convert text to a table using comma as delimiter in a Word document from the GitHub.

By executing the program, you will get the Word document as follows.

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed learning about how to convert text to a table using comma as delimiter in a Word document.

You can refer to our ASP.NET Core DocIO feature tour page to know about its other groundbreaking feature representations and documentation, and how to quickly get started for configuration specifications. You can also explore our ASP.NET Core DocIO example to understand how to create and manipulate data.

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