How Ressura reads your files

Checked against the app on October 3, 2026

Before Ressura takes a single price or line from a spreadsheet, it reads the whole file once and works out what it is. That is the file's Reading, and everything Ressura files and checks is taken from it.

What Ressura reads

Ressura looks at every sheet before it reads any of them. It works out what the file is and who it names, and what each sheet is for: the main list, a sheet that repeats it, a sheet that adds items the main list lacks, an index, notes or totals. On each sheet it finds the row that holds the column headings, where the lines start, how lines group into invoices, which column holds each value, and which values have to be worked out, such as a line's amount from its quantity and unit price. It also notes anything that could catch a reader out: a column that does not mean what its heading says, item codes that lost their leading zeros, or a totals row inside the table.

Two independent readers read each file, and Ressura uses what they agree on. When they disagree, a third reads it, and anything still unsettled becomes a question for you. Every figure, such as how many items a sheet holds or which column the prices are in, is then counted by Ressura from the file itself, never taken from a reader's words.

One sentence, one tap

When you add a spreadsheet with Add to Data Room, drop it on Ask Ressura, import it from a Google Drive folder, or open a document that is waiting for its type, Ressura says what it read in one sentence, for example:

Ressura read this as a supplier's price list to Paragon Plumbing: 1,540 items on Master Data, codes in column A, prices in column D (Buy Price). Ten sheets repeat Master Data and are left out.

If that is right, choose Confirm and check. The document is filed as Ressura read it, its credits are charged as before, and its module checks it. When the file names its supplier, the sentence names it too; when it does not, Ressura asks Whose price list is this? in one line, starting from a name it found above the prices, in the column headings or in the file name. A sheet of rows also says how many rows it holds and what they cost, and when every date in it could be read either way, Ressura asks Day first or month first?

A question only when Ressura is unsure

Ressura asks you something only when its Reading names what it does not know, as a question in its words with the answers to choose from, for example: "Is the price in column D your buy price or the supplier's list price?" Answer each question, then confirm. Ressura reads the file again with your answers before anything is filed, and does not ask them again. If it cannot read the file again just then, nothing is filed and Ressura asks you to try again. When only one reader could read a file, Ressura asks whether what it read is right; choosing that you will show how it is laid out opens the choices below.

Files nobody confirms, such as those a Connection brings in or those added on the free start page, are filed as Ressura read them and never wait for an answer. Anything Ressura was unsure of becomes a question about the file on Actions, answered there with the same choices, and the file's page shows each question with what Ressura went with until you answer. Until you answer, the Procure-to-Pay price check does not check the prices that rest on what Ressura was unsure of: it says it could not verify them and names the question, and checks the rest. Once you answer, Ressura reads the file again with your answer, remembers it for the next file like it, and checks it again. When Ressura could not read such a file at all, nothing in it is checked yet, and Actions and the file's page offer Read again. Changing how Ressura read such a file on its page answers any question it no longer has.

Change how Ressura read it

Change how Ressura read it opens each sheet as Ressura read it: what it read the sheet as and why, its type or Leave this sheet out, whether a sheet of invoices is one invoice or rows (Read as), and which column holds each value, all filled in from the Reading. A workbook of many sheets scrolls within the card, so its last sheet is always in reach. Change what is wrong and confirm: Ressura files the document the way you said, keeps that as the document's Reading, remembers it for the next file with the same column headings, and its module checks it.

When Ressura could not read a file at all, its sentence says so, and Change how Ressura read it offers every sheet for you to say what it is. Nothing is filled in for you to check before you open it.

On the document's page

A spreadsheet's page in the Data Room shows How Ressura read it: the sentence, whether two readers read it the same way, each sheet with what it was read as and why, its columns, Ressura's notes on anything that could catch a reader out, what Ressura assumed (a column it was not sure of, a value it works out), and what you told it. Ressura's notes are its own words about the file; every figure in a finding is counted from the file itself. A price list Ressura filed before it read files this way is shown as read by the columns it was filed with. A price list's Details also say How Ressura read the prices: the sheets its prices were read from, any it was not, and the column each value came from.

Change how Ressura read it there opens the same choices. Save and check again files it again the way you set it, under the supplier you named, remembers that reading for the next file with the same column headings, and its module checks it again with the new prices or lines.

Remembered readings

Ressura remembers how you confirmed a sheet with its column headings, so the next file with the same headings, such as next month's export, is read the same way without asking, and its sentence says so. The Data Room lists each one under Remembered readings, named by the column headings it is remembered for, with what those sheets are read as and the column each value comes from. Remove one there and Ressura reads the next sheet with those headings afresh.