Kick-Start Question: Importing New Tasks through Kick-Start with Multiple Custom Forms and Fields

[JonathanHy1]

Greetings! I have a question regarding importing Tasks when I am using multiple Custom Forms: I would like to generate a list of Tasks for a Project, and I would like: a) to add two specific custom forms (I know the GUID for both) to each new Task using kick-start, and fill out the fields for each custom form (I have each field identified with DE: and accounted for in the .xls I have compiled). When I export, only one custom form GUID appears under setCategoryID in the export, even for Tasks that I have in the system already that have two custom forms - how do I add an additional one for my import? Thank you! Jonathan

[Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStore]

Hi Johnathan, Originally, Workfront was designed to have only one Category (now called a Custom Form) attached each base object (e.g. Project, Task, Issue, User, etc.), so in the database, there is a column called categoryID on each such object. Kickstarts also existed back at this time when there was only one Category, so setCategoryID is exposed to align with that data structure. As the use of Custom Data took off, someone ruined the party (ehm..sorry folks) by creating Categories with close to 2000 Parameters on them, many of which were calculated fields. For performance reasons, Workfront decided to allow multiple forms, but also set a limit of 500 parameters. As good relational database practices dictate, this new 1:many relationship is now stored separately from the base object, although the legacy categoryID remains (typically storing the ID of the first category attached to the object). With that scintillating origin story in mind...to your question. Noting that I'm guessing here, based on how our "http://store.atappstore.com/product/excel-updater/">Excel Updater solution works -- it could be that if you make two Kickstart passes, one each for each of the two categoryIDs you're trying to load, that the second pass will in fact insert the data. As an aside, this would also be similar to having a view showing a column from each, that once you type data in to each, the forms would auto-attach. Regards, Doug Doug Den Hoed - AtAppStore Got Skills? Lend a hand! https://community.workfront.com/participate/unanswered-threads

[VynetaRy]

@Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStore   I tried doing a second pass to insert data into a second form, but I get a message that nothing was imported. I set isNew to FALSE, added the ID of the project that I created with the first pass to the ID column, changed the setCategoryID to the second form, and replaced the custom field information with the information on the second form. Should I have done something differently?

[Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStore]

Hi @VynetaRy,

Since you mention isNew (which is a Kickstart convention), I'm guessing that Workfront considers inserts to a new category on an existing object as an update (which is not supported), vs an insert (which might work, provided the object -- project in your case -- is also being inserted).

If so, I invite you to instead use our Excel Updater solution, and (to clarify my earlier comment),

• the first pass should set the categoryID, effectively attaching the new form but with no data
• with that new form attached, it might be best (and/or required) to manually bulk move it to be the top (i.e. first) custom form among any that were already existing
• the second pass should then set the data values into the new custom form via "DE:" prefixed columns within Excel

Regards,

Doug