Import Item List

In This Topic

ShapeMaster and its associated products have the ability to import a wide variety data directly to the program, allowing you to...

Easily create a new job/drawing by specifying the shapes, one per line, with any customisations in the List View.
Interface/import lists of shapes for ShapeMaster etc.
Import/create new Catalogs - same format, provide each row as a catalog item with any customisations.
Update sample drawings and supplier drawings when one changes to a new library version.
- To do this, export in this format which will provide a compact differences only representation of the job/drawing. Then switch to the new library and import to get the new job/drawing.

In this document we will outline how to generate an import file (Excel format) and then import this into ShapeMaster by selecting File > Import > Import Item List.

When importing, a dialog is displayed (very similar to the Open dialog) where you can select an existing drawing file to merge with the current one. It allows you to control what happens when answers in the current job/drawing conflict with those in the job/drawing being merged in.

In this tutorial we will use Excel to create a data file and save it as a tab delimited file format, with a '.tab' extension and then import into ShapeMaster.

Variable Names for Import

To start with, there are two (2) different items to import.

Global settings - such as Job Number, Customer Name
- These items are common for the entire job and their values are found under Drawing Properties.
Shape / Parts and their associated properties.
- This is where you select a 800Panel shape and you can specify such things as its width, height and materials etc.
- These items are all shape / part specific.

Global and Shape properties are imported differently from within the import file, so you need the following details... Hover mouse over the field...

Global

When preparing to import a value, you first need to find its field name. In this example...

Open the Drawing Properties[F4] and go to the Job Details > Job Settings page, as we want to import the global “Customer”.

Then hover the mouse over the field and the variable name required will be displayed, in this case JobCust.

This can be done for as many Global values as required. The variable name will always follow the word ‘for’, as shown.

Shape

Now we will get the name of the shape we will import, for this example, 800Panel.

To do this, we can find the Shape/Part name using the Home > Shape Selection drop list, as shown.

It is very important to get this name correct and the Shape / Part name must be in the currently loaded library when you import the list file into ShapeMaster, otherwise it won’t be found and will be ignored.

Then we need are the values, such as Height or Width, that we would like to change on the required Shape/Part.

Look at the Shape Properties (you can use the Shape Tool);

Then hover the mouse over the required field and the variable name will be displayed, in this case ShapeHeight and ShapeWidth.

This process can be repeated for as many Shape / Part variables required. The variable name will always follow the word ‘for’, as shown.

Generating an Import File

Now that we know what we want to import, it is time to create the import file.

The file format is Tab delimited and can be created from a number of different programs, such as ERP or Design program, Text Editor, from a Website page or in Excel (as discussed in this tutorial).

Click here to download a simple Excel file that can be used in this tutorial. Note that ...

multiple sheets are not supported when we save later as a tab file, so remove all but the one sheet you want to use.
the downloaded sample file has data validation rules, which you can remove as per the following.

Data Validation Error Message - Trouble Shooting Excel

Issue: You may find that when you try to enter Shape/Part values, a 'data validation' error message pops up.

[If you get message 'Erase current settings' (click on image) - just click OK and continue with the fix.]

Click to view possible 'Erase current settings' message

For a detailed 'how to' on cell input restrictions/rules, click on the Help button (Microsoft website).

To Fix: To remove all validation...

Select the cells to remove the rule from;

Select Data > Data Validation;

On the Settings tab, under Allow, select Any Value and click OK.

Global

Global values get input first - see Extra Notes.

All global values require a ~ (Tilde) in front of them to show they are a “Global” value and they read left to right.

Shape / Part

Column Headings

Column headings (in a row from left to right) provide the middleware variable that will be set by the value provided in that column.

The first column must always be code as it selects the shape/part required from the library.

Subsequent column headings will give the name of the middleware variable (e.g. CabWidth) that will be set by the value provided (e.g. 450mm).

Column Values

Shape/Part values are entered (in column from top down) under the applicable heading - see Extra Notes.

Where data is not provided (e.g. CabHeight below) then no import into this variable takes place and remains as the library default.

Then all the other variables...

Only the values you wish to change from default are required to be filled in. One shape/part may require a field changed and the next shape/part may not, so this field can be left blank, as shown in these examples.

Sample of completed file

The completed file using the examples above, should look something like this...

Also, global values are not actually required for this import to work successfully, so if no global values are required for an import, the entire top section that starts with the ~ (Tilde) can be removed and the import files' first line should be the “header” line starting with “code”.

Save Import file as Tab delimited

Now we have all our data in the Excel file, we need to save it as a tab file format, with a .tab extension. To do this...

Select File > Save As
- The location of the saved file is not important, as long as you know where to find it later.

Select Text (Tab delimited) from the Save as type drop list - note that the extension is (.txt)

As ShapeMaster will not import a .txt file, we need to change the file extension from '.txt' to '.tab' manually.
- Since Excel wants to provide a .txt extension, you must quote the File name as shown i.e. "....tab"
  
  Note on Excel string/quotes
  
  Excel will send strings out wrapped with extra quotes, for example a raw export of 13" gives "13"""
  
  These quotes, however, are stripped and the file will read directly in during the Import/Merge Item Lists.

Import Item List into ShapeMaster

Now you can import this into ShapeMaster by ...

opening ShapeMaster and making sure you have the correct library selected.
- in this example, ShapeMaster-2
From the File menu, select Import > Import Item List.

File > Import > Import Item List

Browse and select the sample tab file that you have just created and import will be completed...
- Drawing Properties details will have been updated (if included in the import file);
- Shape/Parts will be added to the List.

Click to view sample tab file

Extra Notes

Format Shape/Part

The Format is also very compact and flexible. In its simplest form...

First column and the header must always be called code.
- Each column in the header row is a variable name (e.g. shapeqty, shapeheight etc) and;
- Values down the column are the values of that variable (e.g. 3, 400mm etc) for each shape (one row is one shape).
- you can specify an arbitrary number of fixed columns via named column headings
You can extend any row to add ad hoc variables just for that row.
If you leave a cell empty, then no value will be provided for that property.
- If you want to create a property with an empty value, you do that explicitly by providing for a string or 0 for a number.
You can import one or more variables that are not in the column headings.
- To do this, just extend the row with pairs of cells after the fix columns - see example.

Example

In the sample import file shown below, there are six (6) fixed columns (first column must always be code).

But if one of the items needs extra specifications (as shown for row 3), then you can add additional cells at the end of its row, putting middleware variable first then the value along the row.

The pair of cells G3 and H3 sets the variable bordertt to 60mm (top border default is 50mm).

Columns E and F which we set up in this example as edge flags, had to be skipped because these are fixed columns. Therefore, extra specifications had to added after these.

Result after importing this sample tab file into DoorMaster.

Hover over the edit boxes to see tool tip with variable name.

In this screen grab, we have selected the Base 2 door which came from row 3 of the sample file.

Quantity = 2, Width = 315mm, Left Edge = off (E3 has no for edgel) and Top Border = 60mm

The importing uses tab separated ASCII files.

Format Global Defaults

Global rows i.e. Drawing Properties, require a ~ (Tilde) in the first column to show they are a “Global” value and they read left to right.

For example, these two (2) rows would import the three (3) properties AccountNumber, AccountName and AccountState.

Rules

The rules for item list imports is more relaxed than regular ASCII imports.

If you provide quotes around a string, then that forces the type of the variable to be String;
- in this case, if you want to have a quote character inside the string, it needs to be doubled up.
If you don’t provide quotes around the string, the importer still assumes the value imported is a string;
- unless it can be interpreted as another type, such as Number or Money.
If you leave a cell empty, then no value will be provided for that property.
If you want to create a property with an empty value you do that explicitly, by providing for a string or 0 for a number.

Example

This is an example of importing a few global variables...

In the following import the results are...

AccountContact and AccountContact2 give exactly the same resulting Value i.e. A “quoted” string

AccountName has no quotes at all but still imports as a String.

AccountNumber imports as a Whole Number because the value 12345678 provided in numeric.

AccountEmail required a quote to import an empty string.

The last line $AccountWFormula has a $ in front of the variable name, so that 11+22 is interpreted as a formula.