CSV File Connector
The CSV file Connector is implemented to link ASM Core and any Comma Separated Value (CSV) data file. This section of the documentation provides a description of the CSV file Connector.
Before you start
Before you read this documentation, it is recommended that you review the Integrated Platform Configuration documentation.
You should familiarize yourself with the information in Installing Connectors before installing any connectors, and read the Integration topics for more information on how to configure them.
It lists the resource types that can be discovered on the application and the attributes of each resource type that can be imported into the ASM Core Configuration Management Database (CMDB).
About the CSV File Connector
The CSV Files Connector reads a Comma Separated Value (CSV) file from a location accessible to the ASM Core server, and interprets each row found within the file as a unique resource. Every column imported is interpreted as a property of that resource.
The connector supports data retrieval from CSV files that can be correctly read and manipulated in Microsoft Excel, but does not support any other formats supported by Excel.
Requirements and Assumptions
The requirements and assumptions about the CSV file Connector are as follows:
That each CSV file has a header row. None of the cells in this row is imported. Its contents are used as property names for the data in the rows below.
That the CSV file has at least one column which can be used as a reliable unique identifier (Ref Column). This means that the unique identifier for a resource:
Should be specified for every resource
Should not change over time
Should be distinct from the identifiers of the other resources in the file
That the file has at least one column which can serve as a suitable descriptive name for the resource.
Strip file data of all commas before converting to .CSV
Strip all file data of extra spaces and special characters where possible.
The .CSV import matches first on the reference number on your file and if it does not find a match, evaluates matching criteria that you have specified on the Matching tab. For this reason your reference numbers must remain unique in perpetuity.
Best Practice
Alemba recommends you maintain a change log in ASM against the ASM CI, with the files for all .CSV Data imports attached to the ASM CI itself (not your change request).
The reference number series used should appear in the file name so that others can ensure they are not reusing reference values. This makes seeing the ranges easy when logging a new Change Request to bring in more .CSV Data, and won't require anyone to download or open the file. The Approver for the Change request should ensure the reference values are not being duplicated across imports or files.
The main point is to make sure there is control and visibility into the ranges of reference values used for .CSV imports, however this is accomplished in your organization.
Example Scenario
File A has 10 people and the reference column lists numbers 1-10 in series. We want to match on UserID so the reference value doesn't really matter to us. It is only there for the import, right?
Result from File A
We perform the CSV import and my 10 people did in fact match on User ID and they were updated. In this example, those numbers have never been used so it all worked perfectly.
It has been several months and now we have been given another file. File B has 10 different people to update. I replace the original 10 with these new 10 and then perform the same import matching on User ID as before.
Result
The original 10 people from File A were updated with the data from the new people! That is not what we wanted to happen.
Root-Cause
This is because ASM sees the reference number as the absolute authority in the database table itself. It will only use the matching criteria you specify if it cannot find a resource with a matching reference number.
Example .CSV File and Source Parameters Setup
The example below is using a unique series for the Unique ID Column and the User Login ID as the Display Column required for the description in the .CSV import and the remaining columns will contain whatever data you are importing.
When you setup your import, you will reference the first 2 columns as follows (Click the hotspots to advance):
Please see Resource Mapping to set up and map the contents of your data source to resources in ASM
Permissions
The processes that use the connector, namely Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) and the ASM Core Connector Service, must have sufficient permissions to read the CSV file.
The connector requires only read permissions for the CSV file as it does not update the file.
If ASM Core runs across multiple servers, the path specified for the file must be valid and accessible on all those servers. This means that if the data file is being read from a path in the local drive, for example, C:\Data\Resources.csv, then that location and the CSV file must be replicated across all servers so that it is valid for them all. This applies regardless of whether a server is set up purely to run the web server component or the polling service.
CSV data is arranged sequentially in a flat file. This means that ad hoc access through the connector to resources in larger CSV files will be necessarily slow. For this reason, it is recommended not to use the External Resource Search functionality against this connector. Though this functionality is supported, it may not perform well.
Connector Description
The table below provides a description of the CSV file Connector.
Connection Parameters
The table below provides the description of the connection parameters of the CSV file Connector.
Connector Diagnostics
The connector has the facility to trace information. The data can be obtained through Polling tracing or Application tracing. See:
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