CiviCRM Community Forums (archive)

Dear all,

I'm in the process of building our database for the first time. I've already split the data into different .csv spreadsheets (using Open Office, not Excel) that represent different groups.

I am having problems importing .csv sheets where some cells contain blanks. Our data is incomplete, so I have no way to fill in all the information before import. For example, in a spreadsheet listing organizations, every rows has the name of the organization and its country, but not every row contains address, city, phone number, email, etc. (Some rows have organization name, city, country, phone; others have organization name, phone, fax, email; etc.).

I've searched and haven't seen anyone say that I shouldn't have blank cells, but at the same time, I haven't seen any good explanations of what happens if some cells are blank.

Right now I'm having issues with the country being visible. After importing around 250 contacts, a handful (around 20) do not show a visible country. However, if I go to edit the profile manually, the country is selected. I've tried rearranging the columns (putting country before city), I've tried filling all the blank cells with spaces. No luck. Every time I import, the same 20 organizations do not display the country. I am importing only one address (main).

I'm totally baffled, and dreading the idea that I have to import manually because my data is inconsistent. Can someone tell me exactly what happens with blank cells, and if there is a recommended order for addresses if only one column has a complete set of data?

Thanks.