The Import/Export button on the main menu opens the Import/Export Tool -- a window with two tabs on it: the Import tab and the Export tab. Left-clicking on the Import/Export button will open the tool with the Import tab showing. Right-clicking the button will show four shortcuts that take you directly to the Export tab, and preselect some options for you.

You use the Export tab to output data from any of ODB's main tables (People, Payments, Groups, Notes, Pledges) to a text file. This is most useful if you want to send a mailing list to a mail house, generate the addresses for an MS-Word or Word Perfect mail merge, or view some of your data in Excel or Open Office.

The records can be saved in three different formats: tab-separated text (with headers and data, data only, or headers only), comma-separated text (with headers and data, data only, or headers only), or XML. You may export all the records, or only the chosen records on the main menu. After you click the Import/Export button, the Import/Export Tool appears. Once you click the Export tab, you can set up your export in three steps:

1. Choose what you want to export, including: People, People with extended information, Groups, Groups with extended information, Donations (Payments) and Custom Export, which is used if you right-clicked the Import/Export button and chose one of the four options there.

2. Select the check box for each field you wish to include in the export, and then adjust the order. The top field will be the first (leftmost) one in the file. The bottom selected field will be the last (rightmost) one in the file.

3. Select the export format from the list (described earlier).

4. Select the destination. The default is "Text File", but you can also choose the Windows Clipboard. Two of the shortcuts available from the main menu screen by right-clicking on the Import/Export button will select the "Clipboard" option.

When you are ready to export the data, click the Go button. Unless you selected the clipboard in step 4, a window will appear that lets you choose the location and file name for the data. Click the Save button.

Currently there is no way to export SRC codes using the Export button. As a workaround, you could copy the SRC codes you need exported to Issue, Constit, or Activity codes as described in later sections of this Manual.

You use the Import tab to quickly add contacts generated elsewhere to your database, without having to retype the information. This feature supports both tab-separated and comma-separated files. If you have data in an Excel file, you have to save it to be Text (Tab-delimited) or CSV (Comma-delimited).

We recommend that you include a header row in your data before importing it, listing the names of each column of data. ODB will not import the header row; it is used only to make it easier for you to line up the import data with the corresponding fields in ODB.

It is very important to ensure that your data does not contain any linefeeds (carriage returns or hard enters) in the middle of data fields. Data within a field should be separated only by spaces. ODB requires that the carriage returns only be used to end a line of data.

Assuming your input file meets these requirements, importing will involve five steps (six steps if your database has the SRC code feature turned on - see section B of this manual):

1. Identifying the type of information you are importing (people or groups).

2. Selecting the text file you want to Import. When you click Select File, a "Select a File" box will open and allow you to select the type of file. You have two choices: Comma or Tab separated. You can also use AutoImport to have ODB try to recognize whether your file is Comma or Tab separated. AutoImport will not recognize other file formats. To open an Excel file you must first save it as text as is described on the ODB web site under "Import Help."

3. Deciding if you want to assign a type code to the data. This is strongly recommended if all the data is from the same class of records, and if that information is not already included in the data file you are importing. For example, if you are importing a list of foundation contacts, and you have assigned "F" as the type code for funder in ODB, you could have ODB assign the type code "F" to each of the records.

4. Changing the order of the ODB fields (that are listed on the left-hand side of the import screen) to match line-for-line with the fields of your imported data (in the second column to the right under Import Data Preview Area). Whatever data is contained in a field on the right (second) column, will be imported into the corresponding ODB field on the left. The two sets of fields scroll simultaneously so that you always see how things are lining up. If your old data file contains a field that you will not import into ODB, use one of the tabs at the bottom of the ODB field set to correspond to that data. When you start the import process, you might notice that one of ODB's optional fields (i.e. FAX or Occupation) is not turned on. If this is the case, you must go into the ODB settings area and enable those fields before resuming the import process. (See section B of the manual for more about the settings area.)

5. Choosing any of the import options available. For instance, the "examine duplicates one at a time" feature is designed for relatively small input files of 2000 records or less, or input files that you know in advance will not generate hundreds of duplicates. If you are importing 5,000 people into ODB, it is almost always better to uncheck this option. The other options are fairly self-explanatory: they allow you to automatically have ODB separate out firstname/lastname into two fields if they are combined. They also allow you to have ODB automatically separate out street number and street name if they are combined. Finally, ODB allows you to put any text you want into the comments field of the new record; this is one way to identify where the record was imported from.

6. If you have the SRC code enabled in ODB, you will have a sixth step: assigning a SRC code to all the imported records. A SRC code will help you track how you first made contact with a particular person in your database, or what the "source" of their information is. For instance, if you are importing from an old database, a logical SRC code might be: "Former database contacts in Excel." The SRC code pull-down also allows you to import your SRC codes directly from your import file. Note that it will only accept SRC does that are defined in ODB before you start importing.

You can save and load import specifications, so that once you set up the order of the fields in the data files you commonly import, you won't have to do that all over again the next time. There are two buttons in the lower right corner of the search screen: one for saving import specifications, and one for loading import specifications. The import specifications are saved as a simple text file.

Once you have selected the options that make sense for your data, click the Perform Import button to perform the import operation and screen out duplicates.

The ODB software will assist you in several ways after you begin the import process. When the software first encounters a duplicate, it will ask you if you want to skip all possible duplicates encountered. If you turned one-at-a-time duplicate checking on and the software notices five consecutive duplicates, you will be prompted by ODB to automatically skip all remaining duplicates. Skipped records are saved to a separate file, and tagged with codes indicating the type of duplicate each record is: FL (first and last name), NE (last name and email address), NZ (last name and ZIP code), NEZ (last name, email, and ZIP). This way you can double-check if skipped records are actual duplicates. You can also add any extra data from duplicates to the corresponding records already in the database.

Importing Tips. If you made a mistake, or wish to delete the records you just imported, right-click the Import button in the Main Menu screen and choose to "delete all chosen records."

For large imports, we recommend turning the "Check Duplicates One at a Time" option off entirely. If you are importing a large data file (at least 2000 records), the duplicate checking method is relaxed to keep down the number of false positives - or records identified as duplicates but which are really not.

If you plan to import more than 2000 records, you should also make sure that you save the old data file to the same computer where you have the ODB data file installed; this can be over five times faster than importing your data over a local network connection.

If you have an existing database that has a large number of fields needing to be imported, the best solution is usually to first open that database using a spreadsheet such as MS-Excel. Excel is able to read DBF (dBase) files, for example. Once the information is in Excel, you can use Excel formulas, the "Search and Replace" feature, or macros to adjust the data to a format similar to that used by ODB. Just be sure to save multiple versions of your Excel file so that if you mistakenly mess up the data along the way, you can go back to an earlier version.

Special Note: it is possible, using import specifications, to make ODB import data into the comments field without overwriting existing data in that field. Normally, comments are indicated in an import specification by the number "-16", which tells ODB to run some filters to strip incompatible information, like linefeeds, before importing. The code for appending data to comments is "-17". So If you want to add several fields to the comments containing data you don't expect to use much, you can go into Wordpad and edit your import specification file to include several lines looking like this: Comments -17

That's it! Doing this will cause the comments field to be repeated several times in the list of fields on the left hand side of the window, and it will cause your imported data

Advanced Import. As with the Export feature, by default only the basic contact information fields for the People table are selected. You can easily change this, to include more fields, or import groups, or Payments by using the pulldown menu in step 1.

If you are importing payments, it is important to first input your people data with the OldID field turned on. This field should then be populated with the ID numbers of records in your old database.

Only then will you be able to import your old donations, making sure to enable the import to automatically match up the donations with the donors they belong to by ID number. There is a checkbox labeled "Use OldID to associate payments with people" that you must check off to make this matching process happen.