Description: ------------ In the "Format::setFgColor" section of the documentation, there's a link pointing to: http://www.mvps.org/dmcritchie/excel/colors.htm The text following that link reads: "Beware that the color indexes listed there are displaced by 1 with respect to those used by Spreadsheet_Excel_Writer." I believe the color indexes are displaced by 7 (not by 1 as stated in the documentation). Test script: --------------- $foo =& $workbook->addformat(); $foo->setFgColor(22); $worksheet->writeString(1, 1, 'FOOBAR', $foo); Expected result: ---------------- I expect the background to be violet (color #21). Actual result: -------------- The background is Gray 25% (color #15).

Open the http://sc.openoffice.org/excelfileformat.pdf Go the page 196 (5.74.3 Built-In Default Colour Tables). You have colour tables (for biff5 and biff8). And in your case, violet (alias color #21 on the another webpage) corresponds to 0x1C in BIFF8.