© Boardworks Ltd 20101 of 9

Importing and Exporting Data

© Boardworks Ltd 20102 of 9

Teacher’s notes included in the Notes Page

Flash activity. These activities are not editable. Web addresses

Icons key: For more detailed instructions, see the Getting Started presentation

Functional Skills check

Student task accompanies this slide Printable activity

This lesson will cover:

Importing data into a database.

Exporting data from a database.

Reasons for using external data.

© Boardworks Ltd 20103 of 9

Importing data

Organizations rely on being able to use, move, buy or sell data.

What advantages does importing/exporting data bring?

© Boardworks Ltd 20104 of 9

Importing data

If you have an external set of data, you may wish to importthis into your database.

To import external data, goto File, Get External Data and select Import.

You can then choose to import the data into a new tableor import it into an existing table.

If you are importing data into an existing table, you must make sure your field headings match up and are in the right order. Otherwise you will end up with invalid data.

© Boardworks Ltd 20105 of 9

Importing and exporting data

The most common types of files for importing data are.csv files. If you have spent time creating the correct fieldsin the right order, then any data imported should automaticallybe inserted into the correct place.

You can also export data from your database and create your own .csv files.

You will then be able to import this data into spreadsheetsand other applications.

To export, simply select File, then Export and choose to save your file as a text file.

© Boardworks Ltd 20106 of 9

Which organizations and which data?

© Boardworks Ltd 20107 of 9

Zipping files

Sending really large amounts of data can be difficult via e-mail due to file size constraints.

One way of dealing with this is to zip database files to reduce the size.

Zipping involves using software that applies a compression algorithm to data to reduce its size.

Many organizations will zip large database files but also encrypt them to avoid breaking the Data Protection Act.

© Boardworks Ltd 20108 of 9

Validation

When importing data into a database you need to do what you can to ensure the new data will be free from errors.

To do this you should:

ensure that you format your data or database so that the field headings match uphave existing validation rules in place, as this will highlight if any data being imported is invalid.

If there are errors, the database software may prevent you from importing all the data, and instead generate an error report.

© Boardworks Ltd 20109 of 9

True or false