Data Migrator (Bulk Data Import/Update)

What is it and what is it for?

Instead of entering customers, items or invoices one at a time, the Data Migrator lets you prepare the information in an Excel sheet and load it all at once. It's especially useful for:

• The initial data load when you're implementing AdmCloud (customers, vendors, items, chart of accounts, employees, addresses, opening balances and historic invoices, etc.).
• Later bulk updates on existing records, for example changing a single piece of data across many customers or items at once.

Unlike a fixed-column import, this migrator is dynamic: you choose exactly which fields you want to migrate (including your custom fields, if the record supports them), and AdmCloud automatically generates the Excel template with those columns, in the right order.

Every time you use the migrator, you'll also see a notice linking to the previous version of the migrators: if the record type you need isn't available on this screen yet, it may still be supported by that older migrator.

How to use it

1. Choose what you're going to migrate

1. On the Data Migrator's main screen, select the Object (the record type you want to migrate, e.g. Customers, Items or Credit Invoices). Only record types already supported by this migrator show up in the list.
2. Select the Operation: Insert New Records to create records that don't exist yet, or Update Existing Records to modify records already in AdmCloud. The update option only shows up when the selected object supports it.
3. Press Accept to continue.

2. Choose the fields to migrate

1. On the Main tab you'll see the list of fields available for that object. Click each field you want to include in the migration; the field is marked as selected (it shows as disabled in the list) and AdmCloud remembers this selection the next time you use the migrator for that same object.
2. Read-only fields are not listed here: they hold values AdmCloud calculates or maintains on its own (for example, on a Sales Order's item detail, the Billed Quantity and the Dispatched Quantity are updated by billing and dispatching, and the Price With Tax and the Extended amount are calculated from price, quantity and tax). They are not offered for migration because the system itself would overwrite whatever the Excel file provides.
3. Fields with a red asterisk (*) are required. In Update mode no field is required: the record already exists and only the fields you select change; the rest keep their value. Fields tagged "Custom Field" correspond to custom fields you added in your company.
4. If the object has detail information (items, payment methods, subsidiaries, pieces, finished products, raw material, services, operations path, QA tests, tasks, taxes, units of measure, payroll concepts, hour types, etc.), you'll see an additional tab for each detail type; select the fields you want from those tabs too. These detail tabs only show up when the operation is Insert New Records.
5. If you chose Update Existing Records, also select the Identification Field: the field AdmCloud will use to recognize which existing record to update (for example, an item's code or a customer's email).
6. You can also change the Identification Field itself: select it as a field to migrate as well. The template then has its first column labeled (current value), which AdmCloud uses to find the record, and another column with the field's normal header, where you type the new value (for example, the current SKU in the first column and the new SKU in the SKU column). On transactions you can change the Number and the NCF this way, as long as no other document already has the new one, the transaction isn't void and the document isn't signed. An item's serial number can't be changed.

3. Download the template and fill it in

1. Press Download Template to get a ready-made Excel file, with one sheet per group of fields you selected (for example, a "Main" sheet and an "Items and Services" sheet), with the correct headers in the order the migrator expects.
2. Fill in each sheet with the data to migrate, keeping the generated headers as they are. Don't add extra sheets or reorder the columns.

4. Upload the file and run the migration

1. Select the filled-in .xlsx file using the file upload control.
2. Press the upload button to submit the file. AdmCloud validates the file, creates a process and takes you to the Processes screen, where you can follow the migration's progress (it normally runs in the background, without blocking your session).
3. If any row couldn't be processed, you can download an error file from the Processes screen: it has the same columns as your original file, plus a final column with the error reason for each failed row, so you can fix just those rows and upload them again.

Key capabilities

• Choose exactly which fields to migrate for each record type, including custom fields.
• Automatically generate the Excel template with the correct columns, in the order the migrator expects.
• Insert new records or update existing ones, depending on what the record type supports.
• Migrate detail information (items, payment methods, subsidiaries, pieces, finished products, raw material, services, operations paths, QA tests, tasks, taxes, units of measure, payroll concepts and hour types) on separate Excel sheets, when the object requires it.
• Remember, per user, the fields you selected last time for that same object and operation.
• Run in the background as a process, letting you keep working while it completes.
• Provide a downloadable report of failed rows when it finishes, so you can fix and retry just those rows.

Key fields

Validations when saving

• The file is required and must have an .xlsx extension; files in another format or empty files are rejected.
• You must select at least one field on the Main tab before you can download the template or run the migration.
• In Update mode, the Identification Field is required, both to download the template and to run the migration.
• The Excel workbook can't have more sheets than the selected record type expects (for example, an object with an item detail expects two sheets: Main and Items); if the file has extra sheets, the migration stops with an error.
• Each cell is validated according to the field's data type (dates, amounts, references to another record such as a customer or a ledger account, etc.); if a value is invalid, that specific row is flagged with an error and the rest of the file keeps processing.
• Only the first 5,000 lines of each file are imported, and the first line must always contain the column headers.
• The sheet to be loaded must always be the first one in the Excel workbook.

Availability and permissions

• To access this screen and run migrations you need the "System Administration > Configuration" permission (Add level) in your user group. It's a tool aimed at administrators or whoever is leading your company's AdmCloud implementation.
• The Update Existing Records operation is only available for some record types: Customers, Vendors, Employees, Items, Credit Invoices, Cash Invoices, Customer Credit Notes, Customer Debit Notes, Addresses, Ledger Accounts, Service Requests and Work Orders.
• If the record type you need to migrate doesn't show up in the "Object" list, check the link to the previous version of the migrators shown at the top of this screen; that record type may still be handled there.

Tips and common mistakes