(Please do not quote this post or significant portions thereof - it will be edited frequently).
This plugin allows for batch or "bulk" style editing of a subset of profile data fields, in a worksheet datagrid format. There are also XML and CSV Import features.
XML and CSV import are intended as a convenience feature to allow quick input of personal infomation associated with a DVD profile that is new to your database. Full profile information is obtained by doing a "refresh" from the official Invleos database.
The XML import does not modify existing profiles - just adds new ones. Also, there is no attempt to map or compensate for arbitrary formats. The Invelos XML export format, as well as the CollectorZ export format are supported.
The CSV import does not modify existing profiles - just adds new ones. Also, there is no attempt to map or compensate for arbitrary formats. Two of The plugin CSV Export formats, as well as the DVDSpot export format are supported.
This plugin was designed to edit a relatively small number of profiles (say up to 200) at a time. It was originally conceived as a way to conveniently edit Location, Slot and Notes entries to support the LoadDVD plugin, but has been extended.
To operate, first flag the desired profiles using any techniques you want, then call BulkEdit. Or you can edit profiles from your WishList, or Manual Profiles. There are functions for creating and managing Manual Profiles, adding / editing discs and validating changes before committing them to the database. The command is located under Tools\BulkEdit.
I have attempted to implement procedures that minimize the opportunity for database corruption, however it is absolutely imperative that you backup your database / filters / layouts / html sections, etc. before using this plugin. I reinforce this by a mandatory response to a reminder each time you use it.
So far, with all my testing, I have observed limited database damage caused by a bug, and only rarely, any impact on the DVD Profiler program, which I then fixed ASAP. In all cases, Profiler recovered after restart without needing a database restore (just make sure you always answer "No" if Profiler asks to delete an unrecognized record. Then exit and restart). At the time of release, V0.84 Beta (pending), I am not aware of any bugs that will either crash DVD Profiler or damage a database, and will vigorously pursue any such reports.
- Drop downs created for all multi-value fields, even if not available in the API. BE crawls through the database and builds data source arrays from the set of values in the database. Less of that is need now, due to DVDP enhancements, so I am not sure how much "crawling" is still needed. For example, there used to be no way for a plugin to get a list of all the users or retailers internally. Now there is.
- Bulk load "personal data" - stuff that does not download from invelos, and update an exiting database, using the profile ID as a key. You could do mass updates of notes, Location, Slot, Links etc. that way.
- "ScrapeGoat" feature. Using the forum handle of a user, access the user's public online collection and selectively add profiles to your own collection. Not personal data of course. Just the profile IDs are scraped from the web page, and then you can selectively download profiles from the Invelos Online.
- QuickSearch feature (Alt-F9) searches the entire database - every field in a cached XML for a specific string. Ability to include / exclude cast / crew. Ability to refresh the XML cache before running the search. Profiles where the string is found are flagged. In addition to all fields, Collection Number, Purchase place and Purchase Price can be selected for some reason. Maybe in the past you couldn't filter for them. I don't remember.
Oh, BIG CAVEAT: BulkEdit has always explicitly and intentionally avoided attempting to edit CAST and CREW. Import of cast and crew is supported, but all editing functions are relegated to much smarter people!
Generally, it is NOT recommended to make bulk changes from a remote database client. However, just as the main program, BulkEdit will adjust its capabilities in this mode in order to minimize problems.
- Some functions may not be available, or might work differently. For example, Bulk Cloning operations, such as "Clone To Manual," will not reflect changes in the client collection display. You must manually execute "Refresh Collection F5" in order to see the changes on the client. However, the changes will be reflected immediately on the server screen.
For Bulk Operations, especially in spreadsheet mode, it is recommended to run BulkEdit either on the server, or on the client with a local copy of the database, which can then be backed up and restored to the server for future use. That being said, BulkEdit has been adjusted to work correctly for limited updates. It will be slower and subject to errors in the case of a poor network connection.
Bulk loading a set of profiles.
- Performance improvements are in the works. Don't try to edit more than a few fields within 100 - 200 profiles. It wasn't designed for more than that. Profile crawler to pick up studios, etc. runs at about 10 profiles / sec. So, the average 2500 profile database will take 4 or 5 minutes. It is worth it - you only have to do it once, and afterwards, you can edit Studios and Place of Purchase.
- Excel export is one-way.
- Looking for a way to "edit users" from the context menu.
- The plugin does no "deletes" of profiles or discs, only "add" or modification. If you want to delete something, do it with the main program.
- An error in any data field during validation will prevent the profile from being updated. It is skipped.
- All data fields that have a limited set of legal values, are edited using drop-downs, similar in operation to the main program.
- Pending changes are highligted: both the cell and the row.
- Columns can be rearranged.
- Profile crawler results persist over sessions and re-installation of the plugin.
- The text box for Notes editing has been enhanced with a subset of editing controls, but you can also quickly pull up the DVD Profiler native editor with a right-click context menu.
(1) You can't update disc information if there are no discs. It is a borderline bug that I give no error messages when you try. Changes to the "null" disc appear to work, but nothing really gets put into the database.
(3) V0.83 adds "Edit Profile" to the context menu to circumvent sluggish double click.
(4) V0.83 adds immediate selective update of the datagrid after context menu editing.
(5) "Loan Due" is not set properly for technical reasons. I had erroneously thought that this was working. Should be fixed in Profiler 3.5 timeframe, if not before.
(6) In all cases, if locality information is missing, then it will be generated by using the Rating if available, or by using the GS1 country code correcsponding to the UPC. If the UPC is missing, a manual profile ID will be generated. If a disc ID is specified as the profile ID, then locality will be generated from Rating if available. Locality defaults to "0" (US) in all cases.
(1) Occasionally plugin will lose the datagrid. DVD Profiler does not crash, but must be restarted before the plugin works correctly again. Of course I will fix this as soon as I can reliably reproduce it and figure out what the problem is.
(2) Notes editing will not accept certain characters such as ".", "!", "&" and "#". I don't know why yet.
(3) Disc information fields such as Location may be incorrectly marked "Read Only" if the first profile retrieved has no discs. Workaround is to add a disc to the first profile, then the whole column will become editable.
(4) It is possible for the CSV Import to incorrectly parse fields under certain conditions.
(4) Crawler does not distiguish between embedded values (e.g. 20th Century incorrectly = 20th Century Fox ..) (Fixed V083. Must re-run Profile Crawler).
(6) WishList Priority "ReallyWantIt" is not set properly in edit mode. Fixed in V088.
(7) Loan Due / Loan To not processed correctly during XML Import. Improved in V088.
(8) Loading of Wishlist would flag profiles has been corrected (V091).
Oh my gawd, woohoo, must try, must try thank you in advance a new toy!
Would like to have seen a bulk edit of purchase place, as I needed a quick way to combine Walmart and Wal-Mart.
Ok, try this: (1) Use Database Query to flag the profiles with just those, (2) If you haven't already, run Profile Crawler (takes 10 profiles / sec), (3) Load Flagged after checking the Purchase Place box, and (4) make the changes. I recommend running the simulation first and taking a look at the log before committing the changes.
If this thing looks semi-promising, I will do a "group paste", i.e. copy "Wal-mart" into a bunch of selected cells at once. Now you have to do them one-by-one.
Edit: As of V0.84, the change can be done simply by Find/Replace of "Wal-Mart" to "Walmart" and then SaveValidatedChanges. Couple of minutes and all done.
Ok, try this: (1) Use Database Query to flag the profiles with just those, (2) If you haven't already, run Profile Crawler (takes 10 profiles / sec), (3) Load Flagged after checking the Purchase Place box, and (4) make the changes. I recommend running the simulation first and taking a look at the log before commiting the changes.
May I ask why it takes additional steps to edit the purchase place than it does to change say currency type? Doesn't seem to make much sense to me. But, I am not a programer.
Good question. Let me reiterate that you do the "Crawler" only once, per database.
The reason is that fields such as Currency, Country, Ratings, Genre have specific values defined by DVD Profiler, and are available in a list for me to use. Other fields, such as users, purchase places, tags, and studios are user-definable. There is no standard list. You can add, change or delete entries from those fields. Without going into the details - the only way I can figure out what values you use in those fields, is to"crawl" through the profiles and look at them, and make lists that I save to use subsequently. Each time you select a DVD, I take a quick peek to see if there is anything new.
Other plugin developers understand the issue, so again, if they have any tricks up their sleeves that I can benefit from, I hope they let me know.
Edit: And there are a couple of more types of fields, such as True/False - easy, and the text feilds where you are allowed to type in anything: Location, Slot, Label Side A, ... Notes, Overview, etc. They are also easy.
Other plugin developers understand the issue, so again, if you have any tricks up your sleeve that I can benefit from, let me know.
Thanks for explaining it, makes sense now.
Version 0.82 available. See bugs fixed list at top of thread.
Version 0.83 available. See bugs fixed list at top of thread. Will incorporate support for the new release of Profiler as soon as possible. Anybody tried this thing yet? Results?
I was holding off in replying until I'd had a chance to get used to it. It's already saved me a tremendous amount of time.
I recently placed my DVDs in binders and as things progressed I saw the necessity of renaming each binder (I had given a descriptive name to each but then sorting was a mess). I put the names in the "Location" field and was confronted with the daunting task of editing every profile to reflect the changes. Fortunately, I had saved the contents of each binder as a flag set. Using your program I was able to apply the changes to approximately 1700 DVDs in about 5% of the time it would have taken otherwise.
Needless to say the proposal to allow batch changes would have cut the time to about 1%. I probably have no need to expand on my views on that modification.
When I saw the "Edit" tags I was a bit disturbed but then discovered how easy it was to remove them.
My initial attempt to remove the tags resulted in an error message telling me which titles the tag was associated with. As I had edited approximately 165 profiles in each group the the error message bottom was off the page and I couldn't clear it without restarting Profiler. That was a Profiler problem not yours.
I had some problems in clearing the "Sheet data" but discovered that by clearing any Profile fields which had been selected and then reloading the profile group the problem disappeared and I was able to clear it successfully.
Another plus: the listing showed some errors I had in the location of the second disc in a set and disclosed some manual profiles which didn't need to be. The ability to edit the profile directly by double-clicking was great.
I am dancing in the streets! Thanks for that. Any suggestion on the TAGs is welcome. Maybe I should offer an option to turn them off, but I wanted to put as much stuff in as possible that would give people a comfort level, and an audit trail in case something goes wrong.
This plugin will finally mean that I can delete all of those old Notes that are no longer valid. I'm just in the process of downloading, once I've tried it I'll let you know how it goes.