Title: Import Error 23 Last modified: August 20, 2016 --- # Import Error 23 * Resolved [daftaikou](https://wordpress.org/support/users/daftaikou/) * (@daftaikou) * [13 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/) * First off, this plugin is great! It is very useful and exactly what I was looking for. * I am having one small problem and am not sure if I am doing something wrong. * I created about 10 tables, and exported them so I could sort them more through excel on my computer. Then, I saved the excel file as .html to try and import it back into TablePress to make a whole new table with only specific entries from the previous 10 tables. [For example, for all of the entries in tables 1-10, they were either Type A or Type B, and I wanted to make a final table 11 for Type A and a final table 12 for Type B] * However, when I try to import I get this error: Error 23: htmlParseEntityRef: expecting ‘;’ in line 5, column 220 Error 23: htmlParseEntityRef: expecting ‘;’ in line 6, column 220 * There is no ‘;’ in any of the sheet. I am confused at what is wrong * Any guidance would be appreciated! * [http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/tablepress/](http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/tablepress/) Viewing 10 replies - 1 through 10 (of 10 total) * Plugin Author [Tobias Bäthge](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tobiasbg/) * (@tobiasbg) * [13 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293573) * Hi, * thanks for your post, and sorry for the trouble. * The reason for this is that the HTML files that Excel generates are not always valid. Besides the plain HTML, they contain a lot of internal meta data, which then causes the import problems that you are experiencing. * The “fix” for this is rather easy: Instead of using HTML as the format for import and export here, just use the CSV format. That will contain your data in the same way, but is much more reliable. * Regards, Tobias * Thread Starter [daftaikou](https://wordpress.org/support/users/daftaikou/) * (@daftaikou) * [13 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293579) * Tobias, * Thank you for your swift reply. * I had originally tried to import/export in CSV format. However, my table includes HTML and CSV format does not seem to allow to keep HTML format. * Sorry for the trouble, I am new/beginner at this. * Thanks, Sara * Thread Starter [daftaikou](https://wordpress.org/support/users/daftaikou/) * (@daftaikou) * [13 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293582) * I am going to copy / paste each cell into a new TablePress table. I don’t think there is going to be any easy way for me to keep format in a CSV file. * One feature that would be great in the future is the ability to copy row/column/ cells into a new table! That way I could have just copied the desired rows into a new Table 🙂 * Thanks for your help!! * Plugin Author [Tobias Bäthge](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tobiasbg/) * (@tobiasbg) * [13 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293586) * Hi Sara, * HTML in CSV files shouldn’t be a problem, or at least TablePress doesn’t have one with it. It might be possible though that Excel can not cope with that and“ mangles” things. Is the HTML in the CSV file correct when you export a table from TablePress? * Copying entire rows/columns is not really possible, unfortunately, due to the different formats and the layout of the textareas. Sorry 🙁 * Regards, Tobias * Thread Starter [daftaikou](https://wordpress.org/support/users/daftaikou/) * (@daftaikou) * [13 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293588) * Hi Tobias, * The HTML in the CSV files exports from Tablepress correctly. I think the real issue is that the file itself contains “;”, “,”, “/” and that messes up the columns/ rows and stuff. * I cannot have the table without the “;”, “,”, and “/” because it is a giant spreadsheet of scientific scholarly references, and the correct reference format contains“;” and “,” while the titles often contain “/”. * So, the debate is what would take more time, copying/pasting table to table in Tablepress, or exporting via CSV and taking the time to correct the cells, sorting into separate sheets, and importing into TablePress. * Thank you for your insight 🙂 I really love your plugin, despite this little problem! * Plugin Author [Tobias Bäthge](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tobiasbg/) * (@tobiasbg) * [13 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293589) * Hi, * these special characters like “;”, “,”, “/” are however “escaped” during the CSV export, so those should not be a problem. Have you tried the export with different “Delimiters”? Depending on the language that your Windows/Excel uses, this might be important. For example, in Germany, Excel prefers “;”, while English version of Excel prefer “,” as the delimiter. * And can you maybe send me an email with an example Excel file, and a corresponding CSV file that does not get imported into TablePress properly? I could then investigate, if there’s maybe a bug in TablePress (which I don’t hope 🙂 ) or if it’s more the fault of Excel. You can find my email address in the main plugin file “tablepress. php”, and to send me the files, please put them into a ZIP archive. * Regards, Tobias * Thread Starter [daftaikou](https://wordpress.org/support/users/daftaikou/) * (@daftaikou) * [13 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293605) * Hi Tobias, * Thank you for your help! * It was an issue with Excel on my work computer. * I was able to correctly import/export using a new delimiter on my personal computer. * This works perfectly now. * Thank you again for your very speedy help :)! * – Sara * Plugin Author [Tobias Bäthge](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tobiasbg/) * (@tobiasbg) * [13 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293608) * Hi Sara, * no problem, you are very welcome! Great to hear that you got this working! 🙂 * Best wishes, Tobias * [Lomlam](https://wordpress.org/support/users/lomlam/) * (@lomlam) * [12 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293657) * hi every body before say anythings i want say special thanks to : * > TobiasBg * i use * > TablePress * in some project ok i have problem when want import xlsx file, because my language is “farsi” and in this language or (maybe) all RTL language you can’t use “CSV” file because “CSV” can’t show farsi characters and JSON have same problem to. so when u want convert “xlsx” to html have error. after working hard to resolved this problem i find very easy very easy way to import xlsx file to html: 1-open excel or any data sheet processor software (open office) 2-select all table and copy (ctrl+c) 3-go to any web editor software (like Dreamweaver – notpad++-….) i use lovely Dreamweaver 4-create HTML file 5-past “specially” (keep format & table) that’s it. u have standard HTML table with out any unused additional data. after that save and import to plugin whit out any error every thing’s good and worked. maybe this solution not important and usable for “LTR” language people but very important for Persian(Iranian)user. * thank again TOBIAS your are help me too much. (sorry if my English is not good i’m not native i’m Iranian ) 🙂 * Plugin Author [Tobias Bäthge](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tobiasbg/) * (@tobiasbg) * [12 years, 8 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293658) * Hi, * thanks for your post, and sorry for the late answer. As I was on vacation, I didn’t have a chance to reply earlier. * Very nice! Great to hear that you found a workaround for your tables! 🙂 CSV and JSON should not really have problems with Farsi, but yes, sometimes computers/ servers have trouble with the UTF-8 character encoding. Thanks for sharing your solution! * Regards, Tobias * P.S.: In case you haven’t, please [rate TablePress](http://wordpress.org/support/view/plugin-reviews/tablepress) here in the plugin directory. Thanks! Viewing 10 replies - 1 through 10 (of 10 total) The topic ‘Import Error 23’ is closed to new replies. * ![](https://ps.w.org/tablepress/assets/icon.svg?rev=3192944) * [TablePress - Tables in WordPress made easy](https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress/) * [Frequently Asked Questions](https://wordpress.org/plugins/tablepress/#faq) * [Support Threads](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/tablepress/) * [Active Topics](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/tablepress/active/) * [Unresolved Topics](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/tablepress/unresolved/) * [Reviews](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/tablepress/reviews/) * 10 replies * 3 participants * Last reply from: [Tobias Bäthge](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tobiasbg/) * Last activity: [12 years, 8 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/import-error-23/#post-3293658) * Status: resolved