Excel Dropdown Manager is an OutSystems extension that enables developers to create dynamic Excel dropdown lists using EPPlus.

It solves the Excel limitation of 255 characters in data validation lists by generating hidden worksheet-based lookup tables automatically.

Key Features:

• Create Excel dropdowns from dynamic OutSystems lists
• Supports Code + Value structure mapping
• Supports Excel range-based dropdowns
• Handles large datasets without Excel 255-character limitation
• Automatically manages hidden worksheet for dropdown storage
• Allows input prompts and validation error messages

How it works:

Instead of embedding dropdown values directly in Excel validation (which is limited to 255 characters), this component writes values into a hidden worksheet and references them using Excel formulas.

Input Parameters (for documentation)

AddDropdown

• Worksheet (Object)
  Target Excel worksheet object
• TargetRange (Text)
  Cell or range where dropdown is applied (e.g. A1 or A1:A100)
• DropdownItems (List of Structure)
  List of dropdown items (Code + Value)
• SourceRange (Text)
  Optional Excel range reference (e.g. Sheet2!$A$1:$A$100)
• PromptTitle (Text)
  Input message title
• PromptMessage (Text)
  Input message text
• ShowErrorMessage (Boolean)
  Enable validation error popup
• ErrorTitle (Text)
  Error dialog title
• ErrorMessage (Text)
  Error message content
• AllowBlank (Boolean)
  Allow empty values in dropdown