Hi

I want to be able to import a csv of locations that belong_many_many services. Both locations and services are dataobjects

In the locations model admin, there is a csv import function, which seems to understand exactly what i want to do and is helpfully suggesting the csv format i should use. The trouble is - I don't understand what it is telling me:

Database columns

Lat
Lat
Lng
Lng
Address
Address
Suburb
Suburb
State
State
Postcode
Postcode
Country
Country
Relations

Services
Service

what should the format of my csv be to get a location with a couple of services imported?

Thanks for any guidance

Will

At this point I don't think you can csv-import many_many relations out of the box... Maybe someone can prove me wrong, but else you could do something like this:

- in your csv-file create a column called 'Service', containing a comma-separated list of service titles

- extend the CsvBulkLoader to LocationCsvBulkLoader

- tell your ModelAdmin to use the new extension:

	private static $model_importers = array(
	    'Location' => 'LocationCsvBulkLoader'
	);

- in your LocationCsvBulkLoader create a function that will add the comma-separated list to each new Location object

	public function linkServicesByTitle(&$obj, $val, $record) {
		$obj->ServiceList = $val;
	}

Again, in your LocationCsvBulkLoader map the csv-file 'Service' column to your function:

	public $columnMap = array(
		...
		'Service' => '->linkServicesByTitle'
	);

Now in your Locations' onAfterWrite() function, you can use $this->ServiceList to collect the Services with the requested title(s), and add them to your many_many relation, using:

if ($this->ServiceList) {
	...
	$this->Services()->add($aPageYouFound);
}

Of course this goes for existing services. You could probably build on this by creating/writing Services on the fly, but that would be more complex.

Ok, cool thanks for that. I had a slight feeling it wouldn't do it automatically and then the spec came up.

I should be able to get it working with those instructions. Thanks very much for your help : )

It's been a while since this reply @martimiz, but this use-case just came up for and I was hoping a point of clarification. You posted:

if ($this->ServiceList) {
	...
	$this->Services()->add($aPageYouFound);
}

I'm wondering what $aPageYouFound refers to?

Pfff, that's allong time ago. I haven't actually done anything with the bulkloader for some time, so maybe this is totally overruled? Or doesn't even work anymore? But, if so, I think I may have meant something like this:

ServiceList contains a comma separated list of page Titles, that you would then turn into an array $titles, and then do a $allPages = Page::get()->filter(array('Title' => $titles)) and then loop $allPages and add each 'page you found' as a Service, using that phrase...

Wow, thank you! I thought it was a long shot asking that question so really appreciate your time!