Import Project Labor Categories

This feature allows for the importing of Project level Labor Category information into the Unanet system.

Within one labor category import file, an Administrator can import labor category data for one to many projects, across multiple organizations if desired. The Project Manager version of the import restricts the importing of labor category data to the specific project the Project Manager is accessing. To access the project level import, go to Project >> List, edit a project, and click on Labor Categories >> Import in the left menu.

Roles

This screen is available to users having any of the following roles: Administrator, P&R Administrator (and Project Managers have a project level version)

License

This feature is available with any Unanet edition.

Performance Tip Note: Depending on the number of users in your installation and other factors such as the overall performance of your platform, the activity of importing one or many files may take up to several minutes. Should this be the case with your installation, you may want to consider running these processes at non-peak times to minimize database contention.

Topics covered on this help page include:

Import File Record Layout (field by field descriptions)
Import File Format (note about csv layout and option to import a subset of columns using header values)
Excel Template (spreadsheet template containing column headings)
Import Screen (invoking the import via the user interface)

Import File Record Layout

IMPORTANT: Note that there are multiple places within this documentation that say you MUST use double quotes for the strings in your import. If you are working in Excel, Excel will provide the double quotes and thus you do not need to add them in manually. Manually adding double quotes within Excel would result in multiple sets of double quotes in the resulting .csv file and thus cause an error (should you attempt to import that resulting file). Please see Excel Tips for more information.

		Field Header Name	Required/Comments
1	A	Labor_Category	ALWAYS REQUIRED. This entry uniquely identifies the labor category being imported. This value must match an existing Labor Category value defined in your system. If the Labor Category you are trying to import does not already exist in on the master list of labor categories, the entire record will be rejected.
2	B	Project_Org_Code	ALWAYS REQUIRED. This code uniquely identifies the Organization to which the project belongs. This value must match an existing Project Organization Code value defined in your system. If the Organization you are trying to import does not already exist in the database, the entire record will be rejected.
3	C	Project_Code	ALWAYS REQUIRED. This project code identifies the project to which this Project Labor Category belongs. This value must match an existing Project Code value defined in your system. If the Project you are trying to import does not already exist in the database, the entire record will be rejected.
4	D	Delete	This field can be used to trigger the system to delete a project labor category entry entirely (including all of its rate entries) or it can be used to delete a single rate entry for a labor category. To delete a labor category and all of its rate entries, you must include the following text string !DELETE! in this field. To delete a single labor category rate entry, you must include the following text string !DELETE_RATE! in this field. When deleting a single rate entry, you must supply the Effective_Date in order to identify the specific rate to be removed. Note that existing assignments having a particular labor category that is no longer included in the list of project labor categories is valid (this is a way to allow a single user to charge to one labor category while allowing other users to select from a different list for that project).
5	E	Cost_Rate	CONDITIONALLY REQUIRED. If the import file contains an Effective_Date value, then either the Cost_Rate or Bill_Rate must also be provided. This is the numeric cost rate that you would like to associate with this project labor category. This value will override any default labor category cost rate defined on the master labor category list (for this project only). A labor category can have many rate entries differentiated by effective date. When adding a new Project Labor Category, this field will be defaulted to 0 if no value is provided. The information in this field will be ignored if the "Default_to_Master_Rate" field is set to Y. This field accepts a numeric value up to 10 positions to the left of the decimal and 5 positions to the right. Note about Resource Planners and Assigners importing the Cost Rate field: This field will only be recognized for Resource Planners and Assigners that also have the 'Cost Rate Manager' role. If a Resource Planner or Assigner does not have this role this field will be ignored. Further, if a resource planner or assigner is running this import, the Allow Cost Rate Edit (unasource.allow_cost_rate_edit) property will determine if this value may be manipulated. No such restrictions apply to administrative users running this import.
6	F	Bill_Rate	CONDITIONALLY REQUIRED. If the import file contains an Effective_Date value, then either the Cost_Rate or Bill_Rate must also be provided. This is the numeric bill rate that you would like to associate with this project labor category. This value will override any default labor category bill rate defined on the master labor category list (for this project only). A labor category can have many rate entries differentiated by effective date. When adding a new Project Labor Category, this field will be defaulted to 0 if no value is provided. The information in this field will be ignored if the "Default_to_Master_Rate" field is set to Y. This field accepts a numeric value up to 10 positions to the left of the decimal and 5 positions to the right. Note about Resource Planners and Assigners importing the Bill Rate field: This field will only be recognized for Resource Planners and Assigners that also have the 'Bill Rate Manager' role. If a Resource Planner or Assigner does not have this role this field will be ignored. Further, if a resource planner or assigner is running this import, the Allow Bill Rate Edit (unasource.allow_bill_rate_edit) property will determine if this value may be manipulated. No such restrictions apply to administrative users running this import.
7	G	Effective_Date	CONDITIONALLY REQUIRED. Required on Update If you provide an Effective_Date you must also provide either a Bill_Rate or Cost_Rate value. This field is required if the Bill_Rate or Cost_Rate fields are provided or if the Default_to_Master_Rate is set to N in the import file. Should you only have a single rate entry for this labor category, you would use the "BOT" value when updating. Optional on Add - This field will be defaulted to BOT if not provided when adding a new Labor Category. Required on Delete - This field is required if you are attempting to delete a specific entry. This field represents the date a particular rate is to become effective. If this is an update to, or a deletion of, an existing labor category entry, then this value must match the value of an existing entry. Recommended date format: yyyy-MM-dd See Allowable Date Formats for more options. You can also use the value "BOT" (beginning of time)
8	H	Default_to_Master_Rate	A value of "Y" indicates that the rates for this project labor category will be defaulted to the Master Labor Category rates, and a value of "N" indicates that project level override rates will be supplied. The default is "Y". When updating an existing entry, if a value of "N" is provided, then the import file must also contain an Effective_Date and either a Bill_Rate or Cost_Rate value.

Note: Check out the Unanet Data Model for specific field data types, lengths, and other attributes. Navigate to Unanet Support and search for "Data Model".

Import File Format

The file to import must be saved in a comma delimited format. The fields can be enclosed in double quotes -- which would be particularly necessary should the data being imported contain commas.

Importing a Sub-Set of Columns using a Field Header Record

If you are not using the default column layout sequence as defined above, you must include a header record (prefixed with an asterisk *), containing the column Header Names for those columns you are including in the import file (to indicate what data is contained in each column). The specific Header Names for each column are listed in the table above.

Example:

*Labor_Category,Project_Org_Code,Project_Code,Delete
labor_cat1,org1,project1,!DELETE!

Excel Template

You can create the comma delimited import file with any number of tools. For those interested in using an Excel spreadsheet to create the file, you can download an Excel Template with predefined headers.

See the Excel Tips regarding the use of double quotes and more.

Import Screen

The Import Project Labor Category screen simply looks like:

Field Descriptions:

Field	Description
Type of Import	Select the appropriate import type from the list of available types of imports.
File to Import	Enter (or browse for) the file that you would like to import.
Output Options	Specify the level of detail included in the output.

The import process is triggered by pressing the Import button. All Warnings and Error messages are written to the screen and can then be saved if desired. While some line items may be found invalid and rejected, the remaining line items will be successfully imported and saved in the database. The rejected line items will be written out to a file on the Unanet server as well as displayed at the bottom of the Import results page. The rejected record file name will be the import name (from the Type of Import drop-down on the Admin>> Import page) , concatenated with a space and "Errors.csv" (e.g., Item - Master Errors.csv, Alternate.csv, etc.). The file will be placed in the Unanet temporary directory (which is defined by the Temp Directory (Fully Qualified Directory Name) (unanet.temp_directory) Unanet property). You can also click on the Download the error file link at the bottom of the Import results page (sample image follows).