Load data from a web browser

Last updated

10:21, 27 Apr 2017
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Overview

Explains what the feature is or what its benefits are to the user or customer.

Feature

The simplest way to load data is to upload a CSV or Excel file from the ThoughtSpot Web interface. This method is recommended for small, one time data loads. Using this method, the data schema is created for you automatically.

Loading data from a Web browser requires your data to be in a CSV (comma separated values) or a native Excel file.

Any user who belongs to a group that has the privilege Has administration privileges or Can upload user data will be able to upload their own data from the browser.

CSV is a common format for transferring data between databases. Your ETL (extract, transform, load) process will typically generate CSV files. You can also create a CSV file from a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet by opening the spreadsheet in Excel, choosing Save As and selecting CSV.

ThoughtSpot supports a wide range of date and timestamp formats in the CSV file.

Loading data through the Web browser is recommended for smaller tables (under 50MB) with simple relationships between them. If you are loading a fact table that joins to dimension tables, you must load the fact table first, and then the dimension tables. The joining key must be a single column of unique values in the dimension table. NULL values in the fact table will not be able to be joined.

Blank values in user uploaded CSV files are interpreted as NULL values. These include the values (case insensitive):

NULL
\N
NA
N/A
[space]

To load the CSV or Excel file into ThoughtSpot:

Log in to ThoughtSpot from a browser.
Click on Data, on the top navigation bar.

Data tab
Click the Actions button in the upper right corner, and select Upload Data.

Upload data
Upload the CSV or Excel file by doing one of these options:
- Click on Browse your files and select the file.
- Drag and drop the file into the drop area.
Answer the question Are the column names already defined in the file header?
Answer the question Are the fields separated by? Click Next.
Click on the column header names to change them to more useful names, if you'd like. Click Next.
Review the automatically generated data types for each column, and make any changes you want. There are four data types: Text, Integer, Decimal, and Date.
Click Import.
Click Link to Existing Data if you want to link the data you uploaded to the data in another table or worksheet. Or click Search if you want to begin a new search.