I have a contact manager program and I would like
to offer the feature
to import csv files. The problem is that different data sources order the fields in different ways. I thought of programming an interface for the user
to tell it the field order and how
to handle exceptions.
Here is an example line in one of many possible field orders:
"ID#","Name","Rank","Address1","Address2","City","State","Country","Zip","Phone#","Email","Join Date","Sponsor ID","Sponsor Name"
"Z1234","Call, Anson","STU","1234 E. 6578 S.","","Somecity","TX","United States","012345","000-000-0000","
[email protected]","5/24/2010","z12343","Quantum Independence"
Notice that in one data field "Name" there is a comma
to separate last name and first name and in another there is not.
My plan is
to have a line for each field (ie ID, Name, City etc.) and a statement "import
to" and list box with options like: Don't Import, BusinessJoin Date, First Name, Zip
and the program recognizes those as properties of an object...
I'd also like the user
to be able
to record preset field orders so they can re-use them for csv files from the same download source.
Then I also need it
to check if a record all ready exists (is there a record for Anson Call all ready?) and allow the user
to tell it what
to do if there is a record (ie mailing address may have changes, so if that field is filled overwrite it, or this mailing address is invalid, leave the current data untouched for this person, overwrite the rest).
While I'm capable of coding this...i'm not very excited about it and I'm wondering if there's a tool or set of tools out there
to all ready perform most of this functionality...
I hope this makes sense...
