Text, numbers, yes/no and dates in a spreadsheet

A spreadsheet cell can hold text, a number, a date or a yes/no value. Content Uploader reads it into text first, and the field you map it to then decides what text is acceptable. Most trouble comes from dates, so they come first.

Dates#

In Excel and OpenDocument files#

A cell formatted as a date (or date and time) is read as the date it stores, as 2026-09-27 13:45:00. A date without a time is read as midnight, 2026-09-27 00:00:00. The way the cell is displayed (27/09/26, September 27) does not matter. This is the most reliable way to give dates: use real date cells.

In CSV files and in text cells#

A CSV file holds only text, so the cell is read exactly as written, and the destination understands it as a date if it is one of the usual formats. The safe choices are:

Be careful with dates that use slashes, dashes or dots, because the order of day and month is decided by the separator, not by your country:

Excel exports CSV files with dates as your computer's regional settings show them, so a file saved in one country may read differently in another. Format the date column as yyyy-mm-dd hh:mm before exporting, or upload the Excel file itself.

A cell that is not a date at all (next Tuesday-ish, Q3 2026, TBD) gives the row the error The resolved value must be a valid date. and the row is skipped. A field that needs an exact date, such as the start of a sale, also names a date that does not exist (2026-02-30) and says The resolved value must be a valid date, such as 2026-11-30. An empty cell is not an error; what it does depends on how the field is mapped (empty cells).

Time zones#

A date without a time zone is read in a particular zone, and the two platforms differ:

• WordPress: the date is read as UTC and then shown in the site's own time zone. If your site is set to a zone other than UTC, a cell 2026-09-27 09:00 becomes 09:00 UTC, which is 11:00 on a site set to Malta time in summer. To say "09:00 on my site's clock", add the site's offset: 2026-09-27 09:00:00+02:00. A trailing Z means UTC.
• Joomla: the date is read in the publishing account's time zone (or the site's, if the account has none) and stored as UTC, exactly as Joomla's own article form does. No shift appears.

The Publish date in the review and the preview shows the date as it was read from your file, before the site applies its zone.

Numbers#

• In Excel and OpenDocument files a number cell is read as a plain decimal with a dot: 12.5. A percentage is read as a fraction (50% is 0.5) and a currency amount without its symbol. Excel keeps only 15 significant digits: a number with more is rounded by Excel itself, before Content Uploader sees it.
• In CSV files and text cells, a number is read as it is written: 12.5 and 12,50 are both 12.5, 1,299.00 and 1.299,00 are both 1299, and a currency symbol is ignored. A comma or a dot followed by exactly three digits (1,234) could be a decimal or a thousands separator, so the field refuses it and asks you to choose how the file writes numbers (Numbers in the file are written, under the field). A number field gets The resolved value must be a number, such as 12 or 12.5. for anything that is not a number; a whole-number field gets The resolved value must be a whole number. Prices, stock and sales lists every case.
• Leading zeros are lost when Excel stores a code such as 007 as a number. Format the column as Text before you type the values, or use a CSV file. IDs and codes with leading zeros are best kept as text.
• Long numbers (barcodes, phone numbers) should be stored as text in Excel too; shown as 1.23E+15, they have already lost digits.

Yes and no#

A yes/no field accepts TRUE or FALSE (what Excel writes for a checkbox or a logical cell), 1 or 0, and yes, no, on and off, in any case. Anything else gives The resolved value must be yes or no, such as TRUE, FALSE, 1 or 0.

Formulas and formatting#

A cell with a formula is read as the result that was last saved in the file: Content Uploader never calculates anything. If you change the inputs of a formula in a program that does not recalculate before saving, the old result is uploaded. Number formats, colours, fonts and column widths are ignored, and so are comments.

Three more things that surprise people:

• Hidden rows and columns are read. A filter or a hidden row hides data from you, not from Content Uploader. Delete the rows you do not want published.
• Merged cells hold their value only in the first cell of the merged area; the others are empty. Unmerge them and fill the value down, so that every row has its own.
• Only the first worksheet is read. Other sheets in the workbook are ignored.

Text#

Text is taken as it is written, including line breaks inside a cell. For HTML in cells see HTML in cells; for accents and symbols see character encoding. A single cell may hold at most 32 KB of text.