import junit.framework.Assert; import org.apache.poi.ss.usermodel.Cell; import org.apache.poi.ss.usermodel.Row; import org.apache.poi.ss.usermodel.Sheet; import org.apache.poi.ss.usermodel.Workbook; import org.apache.poi.ss.util.CellReference; import org.apache.poi.xssf.streaming.SXSSFWorkbook; public static void main(String[] args) throws Throwable { SXSSFWorkbook wb = new SXSSFWorkbook(100); // keep 100 rows in memory, exceeding rows will be flushed to disk Sheet sh = wb.createSheet(); for(int rownum = 0; rownum < 1000; rownum++){ Row row = sh.createRow(rownum); for(int cellnum = 0; cellnum < 10; cellnum++){ Cell cell = row.createCell(cellnum); String address = new CellReference(cell).formatAsString(); cell.setCellValue(address); } } // Rows with rownum < 900 are flushed and not accessible for(int rownum = 0; rownum < 900; rownum++){ Assert.assertNull(sh.getRow(rownum)); } // ther last 100 rows are still in memory for(int rownum = 900; rownum < 1000; rownum++){ Assert.assertNotNull(sh.getRow(rownum)); } FileOutputStream out = new FileOutputStream("/temp/sxssf.xlsx"); wb.write(out); out.close(); // dispose of temporary files backing this workbook on disk wb.dispose(); } The next example turns off auto-flushing (windowSize=-1) and the code manually controls how portions of data are written to disk import org.apache.poi.ss.usermodel.Cell; import org.apache.poi.ss.usermodel.Row; import org.apache.poi.ss.usermodel.Sheet; import org.apache.poi.ss.usermodel.Workbook; import org.apache.poi.ss.util.CellReference; import org.apache.poi.xssf.streaming.SXSSFWorkbook; public static void main(String[] args) throws Throwable { SXSSFWorkbook wb = new SXSSFWorkbook(-1); // turn off auto-flushing and accumulate all rows in memory Sheet sh = wb.createSheet(); for(int rownum = 0; rownum < 1000; rownum++){ Row row = sh.createRow(rownum); for(int cellnum = 0; cellnum < 10; cellnum++){ Cell cell = row.createCell(cellnum); String address = new CellReference(cell).formatAsString(); cell.setCellValue(address); } // manually control how rows are flushed to disk if(rownum % 100 == 0) { ((SXSSFSheet)sh).flushRows(100); // retain 100 last rows and flush all others // ((SXSSFSheet)sh).flushRows() is a shortcut for ((SXSSFSheet)sh).flushRows(0), // this method flushes all rows } } FileOutputStream out = new FileOutputStream("/temp/sxssf.xlsx"); wb.write(out); out.close(); // dispose of temporary files backing this workbook on disk wb.dispose(); }
SXSSF flushes sheet data in temporary files (a temp file per sheet) and the size of these temporary files can grow to a very large value. For example, for a 20 MB csv data the size of the temp xml becomes more than a gigabyte. If the size of the temp files is an issue, you can tell SXSSF to use gzip compression:
SXSSFWorkbook wb = new SXSSFWorkbook(); wb.setCompressTempFiles(true); // temp files will be gzipped
from: http://poi.apache.org/spreadsheet/how-to.html#sxssf