Use the Data Import Options dialog to tell Voxler how to organize imported data into columns.
If a file is in an ASCII text format with an unrecognized file extension, the Data Import Options dialog appears when opening the file.
The Data Import Options dialog is used to organize tabular data into point databases organized by columns. The dialog appears when the File | Import command is used when importing tabular data from delimited text files (i.e. .TXT). The Data Import Options dialog is also displayed when using the worksheet Import command and when the Show Import Options box is checked in the Paste Special dialog. These file formats are assumed to have one record per line in which each record contains a fixed number of numeric data fields.
Use the Data
Import Options dialog to tell
Voxler how to organize imported data into columns.
Specify the format of the input fields in the Field Format group. The Field Format group controls allow you to specify whether the fields in each record are of fixed width or are separated by delimiters. The options are Delimited or Fixed Width.
Choose Delimited (fields are separated by tabs or other characters) if the imported data uses Delimiters (tab, semicolon, comma, space, other) to separate data fields.
Choose Fixed width (each field is a fixed number of characters wide) if the imported data uses a fixed width to separate data fields.
Use the arrow buttons or type in a row number at which to start the data import in the Start import at row box. For example, a value of one will start the data import at row one of the data set. A value of five will start the data import at row five of the data set.
The Delimiters group is used to specify how the fields are separated if Delimited (fields are separated by tabs or other characters) is the selected Field Format. Delimiters controls allow you to specify what characters act as delimiters between fields in a record. Choose the desired delimiters to be used during the import process by checking the box next to Tab, Comma, Semicolon, or Space. You may also enter a custom delimiter in the Other box. More than one delimiter may be checked.
Specify "Double Quote" or 'Single Quote' in the Text Qualifiers group to indicate the correct qualifier to identify text values in the data file.
Check the box next to "Double Quote" or 'Single Quote' to specify that everything between those marks should be interpreted as a single value, and any delimiter characters between any two quote characters are not treated as a delimiter.
For example, if Space is chosen as the delimiter and Double Quote is chosen as the text qualifier, the string "Aspen Park" is treated as a single data value due to the double quotes surrounding it, and the space delimiter between the words is treated as part of the value.
Check the box next to 'Single Quote' to specify that everything between those marks should be interpreted as a single value, and any delimiter characters between any two quote characters are not treated as a delimiter.
For example, if Space is chosen as the delimiter and Single Quote is chosen as the text qualifier, the string 'Aspen Park' is treated as a single data value due to the single quotes surrounding it, and the space delimiter between the words is treated as part of the value.
Check the box next to Skip leading spaces to tell the software to ignore spaces that appear before initial text (not treat spaces at the beginning of the line as delimiters).
Check the box next to Treat consecutive delimiters as one to instruct the software to interpret any consecutive delimiters into a single delimiter rather than breaking to a new column for each consecutive delimiter.
Check the Treat consecutive delimiters as one box to treat any sequence of more than one consecutive delimiter as if it were one delimiter. If this box is unchecked, each delimiter character marks a new field, i.e., consecutive delimiters act to define "empty" fields.
Check the box next to Use comma as decimal symbol if commas are used to as the divisor symbol between whole numbers and fractions. If your data uses commas as the decimal symbol, it is highly recommend that you use some other character for the Delimiters. This option is more common in locations where the thousands separator is the period (.) and the comma is used as the decimal.
The parsed data are shown in the Preview section. The Preview field displays a preview of how the text in the import field is divided into fields to help you set the other dialog controls appropriately.
The Encoding section allows the choice of Unicode data or ANSI data when importing or opening an ASCII data file. Unicode data is often referred to as international data. It would include character sets from Russia, Israel, China, Greece, Hungary, among others. After selecting Unicode, select the ANSI text translation [codepage] option that will read the data correctly. If the data does not appear correctly in the Preview window, the Encoding may be specified incorrectly.
ANSI encoding contains characters within the first 256 characters of a font. These are normally in English.
The locale section of the dialog contains options for determining date/time values. The Language (Country) setting determines which month names are interpreted as part of a date. For example, if German (Germany) is selected, "Oktober" will be recognized as a valid month name. English month names are always recognized as valid month names. The default Language (Country) is determined by the user locale set in the Windows Control Panel. To change the Language (Country), click the current option and select a language from the list.
The Date order option specifies the order in which dates are written in the data file. The date 02/03/04 is ambiguous and could be Month-Day-Year, Day-Month-Year, Year-Month-Day, etc. The Date order option ensures dates in the data file are imported correctly into Voxler. The default Date order is Auto. The standard date order for the Language (Country) setting is used when Date order is set to Auto. Specify the Date order for the data file import by clicking the current Date order selection and then selecting the desired Date order from the list. All six combinations of Day (D), Month (M), and Year (Y) are included in the Date order list.
Click the OK button to proceed with the import process.
Click the Cancel button to close the dialog without importing the data set.
See Also