IMPORTING A FILE

Question

QUESTION 
 We are importing an excel file.. we have made it a zip file and we are receiving are told that 0 records have imported. The import runs. 
 Please advise

Mike Schmitt · Accepted Answer

If you want to import the actual data types themselves from an external file, you will need to use an XSD file with your data type definition - more information on that can be found here: docs.appian.com/.../Custom_Data_Types.html 
 
Then in order to import actual data from a PDF or any other sort of file, i.e. to be stored in a process instance or (preferably) in a database, you'd need to build an appian process model to pull and parse information. I believe there are workable plugins to pull filled data from a standard fillable PDF, but I have less experience with that. Or if you can use excel files, that's probably more workable - it still requires a process but might be more flexible.

Mike Schmitt · Answer

Can you clarify as to exactly what you're trying to import and why? And where exactly in the Admin Console you're attempting to do this? 
 
FWIW, The "Import" button appearing in the top bar of the Admin Console, as far as I'm aware, just imports saved site admin settings, and would not be expected to recognize the contents of an arbitrary Excel file you've put in a ZIP package. And has nothing to do with creation or management of data types.

Mike Schmitt · Answer

Thanks for the response to my second question - though I was hoping for more detail on what exactly you *are* trying to do - I assume by now that your attempt is to create a CDT / data type, but still not 100% clear on this. Lots of people here would love to help you but we can't really do that if we can't actually figure out what you're trying to accomplish. 
 2 followup points: 
 
 The admin console is full of really neat and powerful functionality. My best advice, however, is to not "trial and error" with ANYTHING in there without fully understanding it, except maybe the "Users" tab, where you add and manage user accounts / info - there's only so much you can break in that one. 
 If you're trying to create any sort of application objects, data types, etc, you should be pretty much only focusing on the Appian Designer console, found at http://<yoursite>/suite/design . Here you can create a "new application" (name it whatever you want at first) and then add objects, data types, rules, etc, via the "New" button. You can create a data type from scratch here - and probably the fastest way for now would be to manually copy across the field names in your desired data type. If you need the data type to eventually connect to a database table, there are more in-depth instructions for that elsewhere.

IMPORTING A FILE

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