Reverse Engineer an Excel Spreadsheet into CA ERwin Data Modeler

Description:
As a CA ERwin user, you want to be able to reverse engineer an Excel spreadsheet into a CA ERwin Data
Modeler model. Where each of the Sheets in the Excel Spreadsheet are representative of an
entity/table, and each of the columns in the sheet are representative of an attribute/column in the
entity/table, named by the first row in the sheet.

Solution:

Make sure that the Excel spreadsheet is an Excel 97-2003 file format (.xls) and not a newer file
format (.xlsx or .xlsm). If it is not, then save the Excel file into this format, using the File -> Save
As functionality. The Microsoft ODBC exposure of the spreadsheet only works with .xls file
formats.
Create an ODBC connection to your spreadsheet. NB: Make sure that it is a 32bit ODBC
connection and not a 64bit ODBC connection. If you have a 64bit machine, you can access the
32bit ODBC Data Source Administrator by using the C:\Windows\SysWow64\odbcad32.exe
ODBC Data Source Administrator application.
o Open your ODBC Data Source Administrator.

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On the User DNS tab, click the Add button.

On the Create New Data Source screen, select the Microsoft Excel Driver driver, then
press the finish button.

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On the ODBC Microsoft Excel Setup screen, give your Data Source Name a value that is
representative of your Excel Spreadsheet. You can also provide a description, if you like.
Then click on the Select Workbook button.

NOTE: The version of Excel only shows Excel 97-2000, but it works with spreadsheets
created in Excel 2003 too.
Navigate to and select the relevant Excel spreadsheet that you want to reverse
engineer. When done, press the OK button.

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On returning to the ODBC Microsoft Excel Setup screen, you can press the OK button.

Confirming that you have successfully created your new ODBC connection in the ODBC
Data Source Administrator, you can now proceed to open CA ERwin Data Modeler.

Import Excel spreadsheet into CA ERwin Data Modeler.

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In CA ERwin Data Modeler, open the Reverse Engineering tool (Actions -> Reverse
Engineer).

On the New Model screen, select the type of model that you want to create. Then
select the Target Server to be an ODBC database, and the version as 3.x (though 2.0
also works with no problems). Then press the Next button.

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On the Reverse Engineering Set Options screen, select the System Objects option
box, and then press the Next button.

IN the ODBC Connection screen, ensure the database is ODBC 3.x. Under the ODBC
Data Source select your ODBC data source, as was created in earlier steps. Lastly press
the Connect button.

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From here CA ERwin Data Modeler will reverse engineer your Excel spreadsheet into a
CA ERwin Data Modeler model.

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