Best practice forum (Archived)

Importing Custom User Fields - Totara Sync

We are just setting up our LMS using Version 2.6.9. Imported the users using Totara Sync, however for some reason the custom fields that require an answer from a pull down menu or date entry did not import. I tried naming the field in the csv file first with customfield_shortname with no success. The choices used in the csv file match the choices in the respective pull down menus, but they still won't import.

On a side note, I imported several before changing the language pack. I tried to change that for an existing record using lang as the header and en_us as the choice, but it didn't change it.

What might I be doing wrong?

Best regards,

Susan

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What's the actual error on the sync log, and did it fail a particular record only or fail all the record in your file?

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There is no error on the sync log, which is one of things that stumps me. It just doesn't update the fields. On the latest attempt, the sync log shows:

4638	66	Oct 30 2014 at 12:37:53	user	Info	usersync	sync started
4639	66	Oct 30 2014 at 12:37:53	user	Info	updateusers	updated user 5034
4640	66	Oct 30 2014 at 12:37:53	user	Info	usersync	sync finished

However the record still shows

sync issue capture

The only field it did update is the nickname field. The date field is supposed to be the hire date, which never updated and the other fields were literally copied and pasted from the list in Totara to the import csv file. On the date, I've tried both the US and European date formats. Neither worked.

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Hi Alan,

Sync should be able to understand date formats other than unix timestamp - it will default to using whatever format is stored in "CSV Import date format" in Site Admin -> Location -> Location settings.

Importing date custom fields does work, I use it all the time myself. A header of customfield_fieldshortname should work as long as the source is configured correctly.

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Agree with Ciaran the hire date should match what is configured.

Unix timestamp is used on the timemodifed column per my understanding.

And import custom date field should work. I did notice if the data type/format in the sync file doesn't match what is specified, Totara doesn't pick up the error. For example if date format is different from what is configued it populate an error without telling what it is. Or the value doesn't match the checkbox (using No/Yes or N/Y instead of 0/1 for checkbox), Totara allowed it to go thru without error.

If it's just custom field, I would alter the file format and input the custom field column one by one and see at what time it updates and when it doesn't. It's time consuming but can figure out which exact column went wrong.

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Thank you all! I tried the Unix timestamp, but that didn't work either. What is particularly confusing is that the date field designed to populate the posstartdate worked as it should and was populated from my csv file. However, the customfield_start field did not. Thank you all for your input!

Susan

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