datacell

A fast, unified CLI tool for spreadsheet and columnar data manipulation.

The Problem

Working with tabular data often requires juggling multiple tools:

• Excel/LibreOffice - GUI-only, slow for batch processing, no scripting
• pandas/Python - Requires Python environment, slow startup, memory-heavy
• csvkit - CSV-only, no Excel/Parquet/Avro support
• xsv - Fast but CSV-only, no formulas
• Apache Spark - Overkill for simple transformations, complex setup

Common pain points:

• Converting between formats requires different tools
• Applying Excel-like formulas to CSV files is awkward
• Batch processing spreadsheets in CI/CD pipelines is difficult
• No single tool handles CSV, Excel, Parquet, and Avro uniformly

The Solution

datacell is a single, fast CLI tool that:

• Reads/writes all major formats: CSV, XLS, XLSX, ODS, Parquet, Avro
• Applies Excel-like formulas to any format (SUM, VLOOKUP, IF, etc.)
• Performs data operations without code (sort, filter, dedupe, transpose)
• Converts between any formats with one command
• Outputs to JSON/Markdown for easy integration
• Runs as an MCP server for AI assistant integration

Why datacell?

Quick Start

# Install
cargo install --path .

# Convert CSV to Parquet
datacell convert --input data.csv --output data.parquet

# Apply formula
datacell formula --input sales.csv --output result.csv --formula "SUM(C2:C100)" --cell "D1"

# Filter and sort
datacell filter --input data.csv --output filtered.csv --column status --op "=" --value "active"
datacell sort --input filtered.csv --output sorted.csv --column date --descending

# Output as JSON for API consumption
datacell read --input report.xlsx --format json > report.json

Features

• Read XLS, XLSX, ODS, CSV, Parquet, and Avro files
• Write data to XLS, XLSX, CSV, Parquet, and Avro files
• Convert between any formats (CSV, Excel, ODS, Parquet, Avro)
• Apply formulas to cells in both CSV and Excel files
  • Supports basic arithmetic operations (+, -, *, /)
  • Supports SUM(), AVERAGE(), MIN(), MAX(), COUNT() functions
  • Supports ROUND(), ABS(), LEN() functions
  • Supports VLOOKUP(), SUMIF(), COUNTIF() functions
  • Supports IF() for conditional logic
  • Supports CONCAT() for string concatenation
  • Supports cell references (e.g., A1, B2)
• Data operations
  • Sort rows by column (ascending/descending)
  • Filter rows by condition
  • Find and replace values
  • Remove duplicate rows
  • Transpose data (rows to columns)
  • Merge cells (Excel output)
• Pandas-style operations
  • Head/tail (first/last n rows)
  • Sample random rows
  • Select/drop columns
  • Describe (summary statistics)
  • Value counts
  • Group by with aggregations (sum, count, mean, min, max)
  • Join/merge files (inner, left, right, outer)
  • Concatenate files
  • Fill/drop missing values
  • Rename columns
• Cell range operations - read/write specific ranges like A1:C10
• Multiple output formats - CSV, JSON, Markdown
• Multi-sheet support - list sheets, read all sheets at once
• Streaming API - process large files efficiently
• Progress callbacks - track long-running operations
• MCP server for integration with AI assistants

Installation

cargo build --release

The binary will be available at target/release/datacell.

Usage

Read a file

# Read CSV
datacell read --input data.csv

# Read Excel (first sheet)
datacell read --input data.xlsx

# Read specific sheet
datacell read --input data.xlsx --sheet "Sheet2"

# Read specific cell range
datacell read --input data.csv --range "A1:C10"

# Read as JSON
datacell read --input data.csv --format json

# Read range as JSON
datacell read --input data.xlsx --range "B2:D5" --format json

# Read as Markdown table
datacell read --input data.csv --format markdown

# Read Parquet file
datacell read --input data.parquet

# Read Avro file
datacell read --input data.avro

Write a file

# Write CSV from CSV
datacell write --output output.csv --csv input.csv

# Write Excel from CSV
datacell write --output output.xlsx --csv input.csv

# Write Parquet from CSV
datacell write --output output.parquet --csv input.csv

# Write Avro from CSV
datacell write --output output.avro --csv input.csv

# Write Excel with specific sheet name
datacell write --output output.xlsx --csv input.csv --sheet "Data"

Convert between formats

Supports conversion between: CSV, XLSX, XLS, ODS, Parquet, Avro

# CSV to Excel
datacell convert --input data.csv --output data.xlsx

# Excel to CSV
datacell convert --input data.xlsx --output data.csv

# Excel to CSV (specific sheet)
datacell convert --input data.xlsx --output data.csv --sheet "Sheet2"

# CSV to Parquet
datacell convert --input data.csv --output data.parquet

# Parquet to CSV
datacell convert --input data.parquet --output data.csv

# Excel to Avro
datacell convert --input data.xlsx --output data.avro

# Avro to Parquet
datacell convert --input data.avro --output data.parquet

# ODS to CSV
datacell convert --input data.ods --output data.csv

Apply formulas

# Apply SUM formula to CSV
datacell formula --input data.csv --output result.csv --formula "SUM(A1:A10)" --cell "C1"

# Apply arithmetic formula
datacell formula --input data.csv --output result.csv --formula "A1+B1" --cell "C1"

# Apply AVERAGE formula to Excel
datacell formula --input data.xlsx --output result.xlsx --formula "AVERAGE(A1:A10)" --cell "B1" --sheet "Sheet1"

Data operations

# Sort by column A (ascending)
datacell sort --input data.csv --output sorted.csv --column A

# Sort by column B (descending)
datacell sort --input data.csv --output sorted.csv --column B --descending

# Filter rows where column A > 10
datacell filter --input data.csv --output filtered.csv --column A --op ">" --value 10

# Filter rows containing text
datacell filter --input data.csv --output filtered.csv --column B --op contains --value "hello"

# Find and replace
datacell replace --input data.csv --output replaced.csv --find "old" --replace "new"

# Remove duplicate rows
datacell dedupe --input data.csv --output unique.csv

# Transpose (rows to columns)
datacell transpose --input data.csv --output transposed.csv

# Append data from one file to another
datacell append --source new_data.csv --target existing.csv

# List sheets in Excel/ODS file
datacell sheets --input workbook.xlsx

# Read all sheets at once (as JSON)
datacell read-all --input workbook.xlsx --format json

# Write data to specific cell range
datacell write-range --input data.csv --output result.xlsx --start B2

Pandas-style operations

# First/last n rows
datacell head --input data.csv -n 5
datacell tail --input data.csv -n 5

# Sample random rows
datacell sample --input data.csv -n 10 --seed 42

# Select specific columns
datacell select --input data.csv --output subset.csv --columns "name,age,salary"

# Describe statistics
datacell describe --input data.csv --format markdown

# Value counts
datacell value-counts --input data.csv --column category

# Group by and aggregate
datacell groupby --input sales.csv --output summary.csv --by category --agg "sum:amount,count:id,mean:price"

# Join two files
datacell join --left orders.csv --right customers.csv --output merged.csv --on customer_id --how left

# Concatenate files
datacell concat --inputs "jan.csv,feb.csv,mar.csv" --output q1.csv

# Fill empty values
datacell fillna --input data.csv --output filled.csv --value "N/A"

# Drop rows with empty values
datacell dropna --input data.csv --output clean.csv

# Drop columns
datacell drop --input data.csv --output slim.csv --columns "temp,debug"

# Rename columns
datacell rename --input data.csv --output renamed.csv --from "old_name" --to "new_name"

Formula Examples

• SUM(A1:A10) - Sum of cells A1 through A10
• AVERAGE(A1:A10) - Average of cells A1 through A10
• MIN(A1:A10) - Minimum value in range
• MAX(A1:A10) - Maximum value in range
• COUNT(A1:A10) - Count of numeric cells in range
• ROUND(A1, 2) - Round to 2 decimal places
• ABS(A1) - Absolute value
• LEN(A1) - Length of text in cell
• VLOOKUP(2, A1:C10, 3) - Lookup value in table
• SUMIF(A1:A10, ">5", B1:B10) - Sum cells matching criteria
• COUNTIF(A1:A10, ">5") - Count cells matching criteria
• IF(A1>10, "High", "Low") - Conditional logic
• CONCAT(A1, " ", B1) - String concatenation
• A1+B1 - Add values in A1 and B1
• A1-B1 - Subtract B1 from A1
• A1*B1 - Multiply A1 by B1
• A1/B1 - Divide A1 by B1
• A1 - Reference a single cell

Use Cases

Data Pipeline Automation

# Daily ETL: Excel → Parquet for analytics
datacell convert --input daily_report.xlsx --output data/daily_$(date +%Y%m%d).parquet

Report Generation

# Calculate totals and output as Markdown for documentation
datacell formula --input sales.csv --output report.csv --formula "SUM(D2:D100)" --cell "E1"
datacell read --input report.csv --format markdown > REPORT.md

Data Cleaning

# Remove duplicates, filter invalid rows, sort
datacell dedupe --input raw.csv --output clean.csv
datacell filter --input clean.csv --output valid.csv --column status --op "!=" --value "invalid"
datacell sort --input valid.csv --output final.csv --column date

Format Migration

# Migrate legacy Excel files to modern Parquet
for f in *.xlsx; do
  datacell convert --input "$f" --output "${f%.xlsx}.parquet"
done

AI/LLM Integration

# Start MCP server for AI assistant integration
datacell serve

Example Data

See the examples/ folder for sample data files and usage examples.

Architecture

datacell/
├── src/
│   ├── main.rs          # CLI entry point
│   ├── excel.rs         # Excel/ODS file handling
│   ├── csv_handler.rs   # CSV file handling
│   ├── columnar.rs      # Parquet/Avro handling
│   ├── converter.rs     # Format conversion
│   ├── formula.rs       # Formula evaluation
│   ├── operations.rs    # Data operations (sort, filter, etc.)
│   └── mcp.rs           # MCP server for AI integration
├── examples/            # Sample data files
└── Cargo.toml

Dependencies

License

MIT