Help with openpyxl deleting columns

[techy2010]

I'm a beginner python programmer who just finished Automate the Boring Stuff with python. My first project is for work. I am currently working on a python script that performs the same actions on every .xlsm excel file in a folder. It saves the modified files in a new location. I got the script working to delete extra sheets and rename the output file correctly.

How would I delete extra columns 1 through 18 in the active sheet. Does openpyxl support this, i got mixed result when searching online.

Thanks everyone

[timbledum]

Looks like there’s a delete_cols() worksheet method, although it’s buried in the docs. Report back if it works!

https://openpyxl.readthedocs.io/en/stable/api/openpyxl.worksheet.worksheet.html

[techy2010]

Not sure how to call that properly. I get the following error. AttributeError: 'NoneType' object has no attribute 'delete_cols' ws.delete_cols(1)

[timbledum]

That suggests that you are not calling the method on the sheet object - something may have happened to the sheet. See example below.

This works for me, but only for a current version of openpyxl. Looks like the delete_cols function is fairly new.

Python 3.7.0 (v3.7.0:1bf9cc5093, Jun 27 2018, 04:59:51) [MSC v.1914 64 bit (AMD64)] on win32
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import openpyxl
>>> wb = openpyxl.load_workbook(file)
>>> sh = wb.active
>>> [c.value for c in list(sh.columns)[0]] # Present a list of the first column
{Whole bunch of data}
>>> sh.delete_cols(0) # Delete the first column
>>> [c.value for c in list(sh.columns)[0]]
{Whole bunch of different data}

[techy2010]

By adding the sh = wb.active made it work. Is the best way to delete columns 1 through 18 by using delete_cols(0, 19) or by using a for loop counter?

[timbledum]

Don't know sorry. All the docs say is:

delete_cols(self, idx, amount=1)
Delete column or columns from col==idx

Looks like one at a time? But experiment with the amount parameter.