Import/Export
I'm still tinkering with import/export with DTS. I think I've posted messages
that sort of circumlocated this problem, but now I can state it explicitly with
an example, so I'll post it before I forget it… 🙂
This is a suggestion for a future manual, online help, or better still, a
little validity-checking within the Import program. I found it confusing
because I didn't know which fields would be blown away or replaced.
For example, I made a CSV file with fields that I assigned to Address Line 1,
Address 2, Address 3 as well as separate fields for City, State and Zip. In
the past, you told me that one of the operations that Import performs is
merging explicit City, State, Zip into that one line in the record. But it
cheerfully throws them away if Address 1,2,3 are provided – my Address 2 field
is placed in City-State-Zip, and Address 3 goes into Additional Address.
In short, techie customers really need to know *exactly* what Import is going
to do with their data! What gets merged, what gets rejected or replaced, which
fields are mutually exclusive and with what precendence, etc.
To follow up on another question I asked in the past: I was looking for a tool
that would take free-form, relatively unstructured addresses and make them
conform into reasonable fields. I found a catalog of software and gizmos aimed
at direct mailers. In it, I did find a program that claimed to do this.
However, it did many other things, too, like making everything upper-case and
rejecting international addresses.
To move my several existing mailing lists into DTS, I've resorted to some
custom programs that meet two goals: where possible, move the right info into
the explicit fields ready for Import, and don't throw away any info. Silent
replacements like the one above confounded goal number two. Next, I'm letting
my receptionist perform the last bits of correction, using cut-and-paste within
DTS.
Some of this "freeform to DTS" ability is present in the Cardfile import.
However, I had troubles with this… the Strings button would bring up an
empty dialog. I wouldn't see the lines of data from the card as shown on page
149. I'm using 4.1a under WinNT. (The same thing happened under regular
Windows.)
One last question: When a new record is entered, the "Select Page Entry"
dialog appears, letting me select how the name is displayed on the page:
business name, last name, or first name. Is there a way to change this setting
for a particular entry? Can this be changed after the initial setting? I
looked on the menus, I looked in Help, I checked the manual… nothing
obvious. If every dialog's title were a keyword in Help or the manual, it
would be a big help.
OK, one other last question. 🙂 When's the new network-friendly version
going to be ready?