It looks good. Imported 100 profiles without any problems. The plugin was disabled after all were imported

Hi Mediadogg,

Sounds good.  A few questions :

1). As a DVDSpot refugee, I have my exported list which starts with the UPC.  I have already noticed (as mentioned by other users) that there is no leading zero.  Should I manually add this in (or write a quick Excel or 123 script to do so), or will the plugin realize there is no leading zero and match it anyway?

2).  I still have my DVDProfiler account from the 2.x days which is very out-of-date (since I switched over to DVDSpot to avoid having to use a local client).  I would guess I have 300 of 500 DVDs in that account.  If I import with your eagerly-anticipated plugin, will it account for dupes?

Thanks for your efforts, looking forward to testing it out.

DD.

Quoting Mark Harrison:

Quote:
Like I said, I prefer this software.  But let's not pretend it's perfect and everything else is rubbish.

Everything else is pretty much rubbish. DVD Profiler can always be improved, but there is not one single program out there which is more flexible and complete a system of keeping track of a DVD collection. Any system which exists solely online is vulnerable to disappearing at the whim of its creator. Only a true database could ever hope to compete with DVD Profiler. The fact that Ken makes money from this product is testament to its quality. Based on what DVDSpot users are saying, I doubt even one of them would have payed to support that product. DVDSpot was a decent online system of keeping track of DVD's and statistics regarding them. Had it been a real database, it might have offered competition for DVD Profiler. But it did not offer a real database and so was relegated to second rate status.

Anyone who chooses a free catalog system over a pay system is foolish. As Robert A. Heinlein wrote, TANSTAAFL!

**** Long Post - Please Do Not Quote - It will Change 16 billion times - thanks ***************

Ok, I promoted BulkEdit to Version 1.0, and it is now available. It has been enhanced to support CSV Import from plugin CSV Export and DVDSpot. I will only describe the DVDSpot stuff here. Other BulkEdit details will be discussed in that thread.

Field Mapping (Updated as of V1.03)

The header is as follows:
upc,title,custom_title_sort,rating,review,source,price,owned,owned_date,owned_custom,watched,watched_date

Thanks to FredLooks and Cyclograph for coming up with the following mapping:

upc is a 12-digit UPC with no locality: locality is guessed using the GS1 Country Codes (thanks Mithi!)
title -> Title and embedded Production Year will get overwritten by refresh.
custom_title_sort -> sort_title
rating (0-50) is divided by 5 and mapped to Review-Movie
review is a general text field - > Notes
source is a general text field -> Purchase Place (Retailer)
price is amount paid -> Purchase Price (always USD)
owned_date -> Purchase Date
owned_custom text field associated with purchase -> Appended to Notes as an XML field <PurchaseNotes>
watched_date is the last date watched: A watched event is created with user = "Unknown User"

IF owned=1 then Profile is put into Owned
IF (source !="" OR owned date later than 01/01/1900) AND owned=0 then Profile is put into Ordered
Otherwise Profile is put into Wish List

Step-by-step cookbook to import DVDSpot files

(1) Install the BulkEdit plugin - note that Net 2.0 is required

(2) Unzip the DVDSpot export.

(2) Open a new database in Profiler. If you know all the Retailers (Sources) you need, then you should define them ahead of time (Tools/Edit Retailers). The spelling should be exact.

(3) Select BulkEdit from the Tools menu. You only need to check one field for display - Purchase Place. Profile ID is always visible. You can check any other fields you want - but it slows things down quite a bit. (Edit: You might also want to make Locality visible, as in V1.02, the Locality can be edited before doing the refresh step).

(4) Select File-> Load CSV and Validate. Pick your file and click OK. Leave the delimter dialog box options as default. If all goes well, you will create profiles at the rate of 1 profile every 1-3 seconds.

(5) When finished, view the log and note any errors. Verify that the correct number of profiles were discovered and processed. Handle any problems - report any bugs here. All your personal data will have been saved in the newly created profiles, EXCEPT Purchase Places. Now select View My Purchase Places. If there are any on the list that you forgot, you will need to add them before running the bulk update - otherwise you will get nasty errors.

Edit: Version 1.02 adds the ability to edit Locality. So, if you see obvious locality errors, you can change them at this time to prevent download errors during refresh. Once again - your purchase places (aka Retailers aka Sources must be up-to-date in the database).

(6) Click out of BulkEdit (the results will be saved for you). Notice that all the added profiles have been flagged (any that haven't indicates a program bug - please report it). So now, select Collection/Flagged/Refresh. You have the option now to download all the profile data from Invelos. At the complettion of this step, you are done, unless you have Purchase Places in your profiles, or unless you have locality mismatches. You can fix locality mismatches using "Change locaility" on the Profiler DVD menu.

(7) To load Purchase Places, go back into BulkEdit - your stuff is still there, including the Purchase Places column. Verify that the Purchase Places are highlighted (which means they are scheduled to be updated). If not, right click and select that row for updating. Then select Save Validated Changes. View the log when done - just to make sure.

Notes:

(1) Edit: Actually, I think the problem with embedded commas may not happen anymore - deleted the warning. I'll wait to see what issues people have and adjust my advice from there.

(2) The processing loop has no "stop" button. At 20-30 profiles /minute, you can calculate how long it might take. As an example, it took almost two hours for a 2500 profile database. You can do things in chunks. New profles will just add to the database.

(3) If you have no personal data, you might want to consider an alternative method, such as the UPC Import plugin.

(4) During the Invelos refresh (download fom the master database), you may get errors due to:
- network problems (a troubleshooting guide will appear automatically)
- "Locality" is incorrect for an otherwise valid UPC. Just bypass it. You can change the locality and re-download the exceptions at any later time.
- UPC is actually not in the database. This means that you, or somebody else have the opportunity to complete the profile, according to Invelos strict standards and contribute that profile for review by a panel of nail-chewing, rattlesnake eating, alligator wrestlers. After approval of your first contribution, you will consume massive amounts of beer or other indulgence!   

(5) Make sure that you have no duplicate UPCs - they will overlay one another. If you don't know the UPC, leave the field totally blank, and a temporary UPC will be created for you, and a "Manual Profile" will be created which you can update later.

Ok, good luck.

Quoting skipnet50:

Quote:
Good job, dogg.

Skip

Agreed!!!

Thanks all. I benefit every day from the database and the amazing program. Just trying to give a little back. Eagerly awaiting actual results. Hoping for no major bugs.    (Edit: Wow, kind of overwhelmed by all the kindness - and on "pins and needles" until somebody reports success ...)

I am a DVDSpot refugee.

mediadogg:

DVDSpot allowed line returns in the Review field, which in my CSV file caused the data following to go to the next row.  I manually corrected my file, but does your plugin account for this as it could cause problems for some users?

I think it's great you put this together and I plan to utilize it later this week.

BTW (I'm sure you know, but for the others reading this) leading zeros are retained in the CSV file.  If you don't see them, the prg you are using is interpreting the data.

Good job dogg.

I've given you a