NetDocuments CSV Import Wizard

Since CSV files are essentially spreadsheets saved in plain text, a text editor like Notepad can suffice for creating and editing simple index files. However, if you are working with a large number of documents and values, using an application like Excel is preferable. However, take into account that, if your CSV has numerical metadata containing leading zeroes (e.g., client/matter numbers), Excel will format the data as Number and it will strip the leading zeroes.

Load the CSV File

1. Press the CSV Import button on the Work Explorer window to start the CSV Import Wizard and carry out an import using a CSV file.

2. Load a CSV by clicking the Folder icon… button on the Source Data grouping to select the file in the file browser.

3. Use the Reload button to change the CSV contents in the window with updates, or change the delimiter or the encoding.

4. The minimum fields to be included must be Path and Cabinet. All others are optional.

5. The Wizard will automatically display the Base file path and the option to select a different one by clicking the Select Folder button, and the Target Library which can be modified using the dropdown menu to select from available libraries.

4. Once the CSV paths and library have been selected, the Wizard will show a preview of the CSV data.

Rows with blank columns will display as “Column[ColumnNumber]”.

5. Click Next to continue.

Versioning

When importing documents into NetDocuments via a CSV:

• If I specify a value in the column “Version Name”, the imported document’s version name is set to the same value.

• If I specify a value for either column “Created” or “Modified” on a versioned document (i.e., one with a “Previous ID” value that matches one or more rows and a “Version” value greater than the lowest value in that group), the corresponding field on the imported document is set to the same value.

In the NetDocuments CSV Generator (NetDocuments Explorer > Generate CSV):

• A check box labeled “Version Name” is displayed in the “Included Columns” group.

• If I check/uncheck “Version Name”, the “Version Name” column is shown/hidden in the grid.

Validate the data in the Validate Files and Metadata page

The following window will display the validated data from the CSV file, in case there is data with errors, it will be highlighted in red color. There is an option to Hide Valid Rows on the right, activate it to display the rows that have conflicts only.

Validation Scenarios

Workspace or Folder Ids will display in red if:

• No workspaces match the specified workspace criteria

• More than one workspace matches the criteria

• More than one folder matches the folder criteria

• No folders match the folder criteria and:

  • The default folder option is enabled and more than one folder matches the default folder name

  • The default folder option is disabled

• The folder criteria is "Folder Path" and at least one folder in the specified path is duplicated

The Ids will be yellow when:

The default folder option is enabled and:

• The criteria field (e.g., "TargetFolderName", "TargetFolderPath") is blank

• More than one folder matches the criteria (e.g;, two root folders have the same class)

Columns representing custom attributes are recognized by their name, ignoring case, or their numeric ID, i.e., 1-99 or 1001-1099.

If two columns map to the same custom attribute, e.g. “1” and “Client”, an error message is displayed after loading the CSV, and the “Next” button is disabled.

Cell values in mapped columns are validated according to the following rules:

•     Path: The file must exist on the specified path. If the path is relative, a file must exist at the base path plus the relative path.

•     Name: Cannot exceed 1,000 characters nor contain any of the following characters: \ / : * ? " < > |

•     Created/Modified: must be a valid date/time that can be parsed by DateTime.TryParse in the user’s current culture. ISO 8601 format is preferred but not required.

•     Cabinet: must match a name or ID of a cabinet to which the user has access.

•     Destination: must be a valid container within the specified cabinet.

Custom Attributes: validation depends on the attribute’s type, which can be one of the following:

•         Lookup: must exist in the look table. If the attribute has a parent (.e.g., “Client”), the parent value must be specified in the row and also exist.

•         Text: cannot exceed the attribute’s max length property.

•         Numeric: cannot contain characters other than 0-9 nor exceed the attribute’s max length property.

•         Note: cannot exceed 60,000 characters

•         Date: must be a valid date.

Column Mapper System Fields:

• Path: an absolute or relative path to a file.

• Previous ID: a string that identifies a document from the source system.

• Version: an integer that identifies a version of a document identified by the Previous ID.

• Name: name to assign to the document created in NetDocuments.

• Extension: extension to assign to the document created in NetDocuments, overriding the file path.

• Created: date/time value of when the document was created.

• Modified: date/time value of when the document was last modified

• Cabinet: name or ID of the target cabinet into which the file will be imported.

• Destination: ID of a NetDocuments container in the specified cabinet into which the file will be imported.

• Target Folder Path: folder path into which the document will be imported. The path is relative to the cabinet, workspace, or destination, depending on what’s specified in the row.

6. Click Next to continue.

Select Default Values

7. Set the default values from the combo menus as needed, such as Author or Operator. There is also an option to perform a Date Conversion where you can select the Time Zone that best suits your needs. A time zone dropdown menu displays. This defaults to UTC, is displayed in the Date Conversion box.

Additionally, the Owner can be selected here. The owner setting always defaults to the current user. You can only select enabled users as an a owner. When you run an import job that creates folders, the owner of the new folders matches the user selected in the “Owner” setting.

Confirm Document Profiles

8. Next, this page shows the list of documents that will be imported, as well as their file types and size. It will also display a summary including the number of files and the total size of the import. If a file from the list is selected, the properties of the selected document and the Custom Metadata will be displayed on the right. If there were issues to pay attention to, some values or fields in the preview would be shown in red.

Configure Destination Criteria

If you have specified values for the appropriate workspace attributes, you can automatically set the destinations for each item via the Workspace Criteria section selecting up to three Fields using the combo menus.

8. Use the Folder Criteria options to Identify the target folder by a class or subclass or indicate if a name is exact, starts with, or ends with a parameter. Alternatively, the folder path could be used as the identifier.

• You can also select the checkbox Import into Default Folder if no Match Found to set a folder to import the files in that case. A name for the folder has to be introduced.

9. Click Next.

Confirm Import Destinations

10. In this step, you can review the list of file names along with their Workspace IDs and Folder IDs. You will also find the links to the destination workspace and folder.

• Here you can hide valid inputs by clicking Hide Valid Rows.

Review Import

11. The last step of the import wizard shows a summary of the import job including.

• Job Name

• Files to Import

• Target Workspaces

• Target Folders

• New Folders

• Import Size

12. Click Next and then Finish to exit the wizard.

13. The progress of the import job can be followed by opening the Job Manager.

Sample CSVs

File	Description

File	Description
Open	A sample to import into PD from a local fileset. Of course this depends on your directories, files and folders. You can use the Generate CSV option from Tools-> Generate CSV