converting .xls to .csv

[yael]

I have a php program that allows the user to upload a csv file. The program reads the data in a csv file and loads it into a mysql database.

The problem I have is that most of our customers send us the data in .xls format, and it's extremely time consuming to open every file in excel and save as a .csv file.

Does anyone know of a procedure or shell script that would convert an excel file to a csv file automatically. Is it not possible because it's binary?

I appreciate any help!

Thanks.

[nashirak]

Never tried it before but :

http://www.ice.ru/~vitus/catdoc/xls2csv.html

Hope this Helps!

(BTW PHP doesnt support edititng/createing etc file in Microsoft office directly. 3rd party tools have to be used, such as this one)