.. SPDX-License-Identifier: BSD-2-Clause
   Copyright (c) 2013-2025, John McNamara, jmcnamara@cpan.org

.. _outlines:

Working with Outlines and Grouping
==================================

Excel allows you to group rows or columns so that they can be hidden or
displayed with a single mouse click. This feature is referred to as outlines
and grouping.

Outlines can reduce complex data down to a few salient sub-totals or
summaries. For example the following is a worksheet with three outlines.

.. image:: _images/outline1.png

Rows 2 to 11 are grouped at level 1 and rows 2 to 5 and 7 to 10 are grouped at
level 2. The lines at the left hand side are called "outline level" bars and
the level is shown by the small numeral above the outline.

Clicking the minus sign on each of the level 2 outlines will collapse and hide
the data as shown below.

.. image:: _images/outline5.png

The minus sign changes to a plus sign to indicate that the data in the outline
is hidden. This shows the usefulness of outlines: with 2 mouse clicks we have
reduced the amount of visual data down to 2 sub-totals and the overall total.

Finally, clicking on the minus sign on the level 1 outline will collapse the
remaining rows as follows:

.. image:: _images/outline6.png


Outlines and Grouping in XlsxWriter
-----------------------------------

Grouping in ``XlsxWriter`` is achieved by setting the outline level via the
:func:`set_row()` and :func:`set_column()` worksheet methods::

    worksheet.set_row(row, height, cell_format, options)
    worksheet.set_column(first_col, last_col, width, cell_format, options)

Adjacent row or columns with the same outline level are grouped together into a
single outline.

The ``'options'`` parameter is a dictionary with the following possible keys:

* ``'hidden'``
* ``'level'``
* ``'collapsed'``

Options can be set as follows::

    worksheet.set_row(0, 20, cell_format, {'hidden': True})

    # Or use defaults for other properties and set the options only.
    worksheet.set_row(0, None, None, {'hidden': True})

The following example sets an outline level of 1 for rows 1 to 4
(zero-indexed) and columns B to G. The parameters ``height`` and
``cell_format`` are assigned default values::

    worksheet.set_row(1, None, None, {'level': 1})
    worksheet.set_row(2, None, None, {'level': 1})
    worksheet.set_row(3, None, None, {'level': 1})
    worksheet.set_row(4, None, None, {'level': 1})

    worksheet.set_column('B:G', None, None, {'level': 1})

.. image:: _images/outline3.png

Rows and columns can be collapsed by setting the ``hidden`` flag for the hidden
rows/columns and setting the ``collapsed`` flag for the row/column that has
the collapsed ``'+'`` symbol::

    worksheet.set_row(1, None, None, {'level': 1, 'hidden': True})
    worksheet.set_row(2, None, None, {'level': 1, 'hidden': True})
    worksheet.set_row(3, None, None, {'level': 1, 'hidden': True})
    worksheet.set_row(4, None, None, {'level': 1, 'hidden': True})
    worksheet.set_row(5, None, None, {'collapsed': True})

    worksheet.set_column('B:G', None, None, {'level': 1, 'hidden': True})
    worksheet.set_column('H:H', None, None, {'collapsed': True})

.. image:: _images/outline7.png

Excel allows up to 7 outline levels. Therefore the ``level`` parameter should
be in the range ``0 <= level <= 7``.

.. image:: _images/outline4.png

For a more complete examples see :ref:`ex_outline1` and :ref:`ex_outline2`.

Some additional outline properties can be set via the :func:`outline_settings`
worksheet method.
