Can’t figure out how to export/import ACF Repeater

Hi Trishah,

When importing data into a repeater field, there are 2 ways to go about it (in this example there is a question, and answer field on the repeater), you could either

A) have two columns in your csv file, question and answer, and witing each of these columns you would have multiple questions and multiple answers each seperated by a delimier that is not used in the content e.g. | then you would update the repeater delimiter to use that. 

This option is good if you do not know the maximum amount of repeater rows you are going to have, however it makes the csv trickier to edit.

B) in your csv file you would have columns such as question_1, answer_1, question_2, answer_2, question_3, answer_3, ... repeating this for as many repeater rows as required, and each time you add an extra question and answer you would need to update the repeater section of the importer to reference this new row.

This option is good if you do not have many rows, and it allows you to easily edit the content of the csv file.

Hope this helps

James

Hello James,

 

Thank you for explaining this. Your explanation is helpful for a single repeater, like one on an FAQ page.

In my situation, repeaters are attached to CPT pages. For instance, I have a CPT called "Programs," and each program has its own page. Each program page has two repeaters, one for testimonials and one for the images for a slider. 

I have a list of all the testimonials and the page ID number to which each belongs. I also have a list for the sliders with the URL of each image and the page ID number to which each belongs.

So, how do I write the CSV for a repeater used on multiple pages?

Thank you so much for your help.

So you have a global csv containing all your repeater data for testimonials and one for images.

I will need to have a think about the best way to import this.

my first question with this method is, if a page has a existing repeater record and the csv has new repeater data (e.g. a couple of testimonials), should this be appended onto the existing repeater, or should the existing repeater be emptied before importing the new content?

I forgot to mention, the method i previously explains would work for multiple repeaters on a custom post type like you are mentioning.

Hi James,To answer your first question, I am importing into a new DEV site, so all the repeaters are empty. Then you said your above explanation about how a Q/A scenario would also work for my CPT repeaters. So, just to be clear, my CSV for image slider would have two columns: Post ID, and Image URL. Importing this would only put the image URLs in the sub_fields of the repeater on the appropriate page and will allow us to make as many sub_fields as necessary. Correct?Or, would I make one row for each page ID and add all the image URLs separated by a |  ?

Using your information (single row with | deliminator) and trial and error on the settings, I got a successful import message. However, there are no images in the repeater. I don't know what to do now. Any advice?

Record Updated: #867 (post_content), slider_images (image) using unique identifier ("post_name" = "a-journey-through-latin-percussion")

 

Can you export and attach your acf field group, and csv file being used.

Along with your importer settings to this ticket by going to Tools > Import WP > Settings / Tools > Import / Export and select and export your importer as a JSON file.

Can you send a screenshot of the importer field settings for the image?

the issue will be with the basename function you are using, Instead if you add this code to your website (it splits the images with a | , then runs the basename function, and then joins it back together with a |:

function explode_basename($input = ''){
    $parts = explode('|', $input);
    $parts = array_values(array_filter(array_map('basename', array_filter($parts))));
    return implode('|', $parts);
}

Then replace [basename("{1}")] with [explode_basename("{1}")]

I would also remove the delimiter value field, as the csv is  treating this as multiple rows each having 1 image.

Hi,

The error is saying the csv is invalid, from inspecting it, i can see that you are seperating columns using ";" , however you also have these in the content of the columns. so the importer is saying it has found 5 columns not 3.

James

The code that tells the importer to use | to make multiple repeater rows works on images and other acf fields.

If you open the csv file in a text editor are the line break there?

To test whether I had the pattern correct, I created a test CSV with four testimonials for one post. When I open it up in my text editor, it shows two lines, the header and one line with the testimonial information. The pattern I am using is:

ID;author;testimomial|author;testimomial|author;testimomial|author;testimomial

I've attached my test csv.

When I upload this file to the importer it says:

Heading	Value
Error displaying record: Inconsistent num of fields, header: 3, this line: 6

Do I have the pattern correct?

In your current example the inconsistent num of fields is caused because you have ; within a column.

What i would expect is a csv of (i have wrapped the content in double quotes as this will allow you to have the ; within the content and not break the csv).

ID;Author;Testimonial
1;"Author 1|Author 2";"Testimonial 1|Testimonial 2"
2;"Author 3|Author 4|Author 5";"Testimonial 3|Testimonial 4|Testimonial 5"

 

The csv looks like it has some empty rows at the end of it (if you open it in a text editor), which would cause that error message.

lol. Good. I was me and not something you have to fix :)

Hopefully I have everything I need now to finish my repeater imports. I want to thank you for your help with this. I  had purchased WP All Import & Export, and it would keep timing out terribly. Your software works much better in my situation. And now that you have helped me with the repeaters, it will definitely be my go-to importer software.

I do hope you create documentation on how to make these repeater import files. I'll bet there are a lot of people out there struggling with the same issue and don't know there is a solution.

Thank you.