You know about the system command, right? I would recommend the multi-argument version, e.g., something along these lines...

system($path_to_excel, $path_to_file);

There is also Spreadsheet::ParseExcel. The benefits of going that way are twofold: the script can then do stuff with the file, and you don't have to have Excel installed in order to do it. However, I think the system command is closer to what you were asking for. This means you need Excel (or some equivalent program that can open its files, e.g., OpenOffice.org) installed on every computer where you plan to run the thing, and it also means the script can't do anything useful with the file; it just opens for the user to work with, that's all. But I think that's what you were asking for.

In reply to Re: Open a file the way Ctrl+O works by jonadab
in thread Open a file the way Ctrl+O works by eyidearie

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.