Transcript Importing and Exporting Data

Importing and
Exporting Data
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This lesson will cover:
Importing data into a database.
Exporting data from a database.
Reasons for using external data.
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Web addresses
Functional Skills check
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Importing data
Organizations rely on being able to use, move, buy or sell data.
What advantages does importing/exporting data bring?
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Importing data
If you have an external set of data, you may wish to import
this into your database.
To import external data, go
to File, Get External Data
and select Import.
You can then choose to import the data into a new table
or import it into an existing table.
If you are importing data into an existing table, you must
make sure your field headings match up and are in the right
order. Otherwise you will end up with invalid data.
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Importing and exporting data
The most common types of files for importing data are
.csv files. If you have spent time creating the correct fields
in the right order, then any data imported should automatically
be inserted into the correct place.
You can also export data from your database and create
your own .csv files.
To export, simply select
File, then Export and
choose to save your file as
a text file.
You will then be able to import this data into spreadsheets
and other applications.
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Which organizations and which data?
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Zipping files
Sending really large amounts of data can be difficult via
e-mail due to file size constraints.
One way of dealing with this
is to zip database files to
reduce the size.
Zipping involves using
software that applies a
compression algorithm
to data to reduce its size.
Many organizations will zip large database files but also
encrypt them to avoid breaking the Data Protection Act.
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Validation
When importing data into a database you need to do what
you can to ensure the new data will be free from errors.
To do this you should:
ensure that you format your data or
database so that the field headings
match up
have existing validation rules in
place, as this will highlight if any
data being imported is invalid.
If there are errors, the database software may prevent you from
importing all the data, and instead generate an error report.
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True or false
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