I have tab delimited csv's with UCS-2 LE encoding that I need to import to SQL using SSIS. I intend to bring multiple files in using SSIS and parse to various tables and columns either within SSIS (preferred) or in SQL. I am using 65001 (UTF-8) code page on the flat file connection, "Unicode" is checked because we have some special characters in the file.
In the preview page, I can see what appears to be my tabs in the source file. However, when I use the flat file connection as a source, the tabs become spaces in the output, whether to a table, or to another flat file.
Is there a way to import UCS-2LE csv's as ragged right and retain the tabs in the output column?
I am doing exactly what is outlined here:
SSIS: Lesson 1 – Export to CSV
But no matter what I do I cannot get my file to open as a "formatted" .csv as shown in this simple.
My .csv files are actually showing the delimiter I choose and the data is not formatted into each column and row. I am having to do the text to column to get the data aligned. What am I missing??!! I am using SSIS 2017.
Is this an issue with excel not picking up my delimiters when I try to open the .csv file?
Currently I receive a daily file of around 750k rows and each row has a 3 character identifier at the start.
For each identifier, the number of columns can change but are specific to the identifier (e.g. SRH will always have 6 columns, AAA will always have 10 and so on).
I would like to be able to automate this file into an SQL table through SSIS.
This solution is currently built in MSACCESS using VBA just looping through recordsets using a CASE statement, it then writes a record to the relevant table.
I have been reading up on BULK INSERT, BCP (w/Format File) and Conditional Split in SSIS however I always seem to get stuck at the first hurdle of even loading the file in as SSIS errors due to variable column layouts.
The data file is pipe delimited and looks similar to the below.
AAA|20180910|POOL|OPER|X|C
SRH|TRANS|TAB|BARKING|FORM|C|1.026
BHP|1
*BPI|10|16|18|Z
BHP|2
*BPI|18|21|24|A
(* I have added the * to show that these are child records of the parent record, in this case BHP can have multiple BPI records underneath it)
I would like to be able to load the TXT file into a staging table, and then I can write the TSQL to loop through the records and parse them to their relevant tables (AAA - tblAAA, SRH - tblSRH...)
I think you should read each row as one column of type DT_WSTR and length = 4000 then you need to implement the same logic written using vba within a Script component (VB.NET / C#), there are similar posts that can give you some insights:
SSIS ragged file not recognized CRLF
SSIS reading LF as terminator when its set as CRLF
How to load mixed record type fixed width file? And also file contain two header
SSIS Flat File - CSV formatting not working for multi-line fileds
how to skip a bad row in ssis flat file source
I am generating a Flat file from OLEDB Source using SSIS. I have specified column headers and mapped them with source columns but SSIS automatically remove special character like '/' from column Header. How can I enforce SSIS to not remove any special character from the header? Is there any way to generate a file having a special character in column name or SSIS not allowed it?
You can add special characters to Flat File Header as the following:
Add a flat file connection manager
At the flat file connection manager editor, Go to advanced Tab and rename your column
Remark: these special characters will be ignored when using SSIS objects like Script Component
I am trying to export data from SQL server 2008 to Excel file using BIDS.
One of the fields 'DESCRIPTION' coming from SQL database is VARCHAR(4000).
I can export everything to excel but the 'DESCRIPTION' field size in excel is restricted to unicode 255 and no mater what I try it does not allow me to export the data over 255 characters (exports it as blank). I tried to change SQL field as varchar(max) or ntext but none of attempts worked. I used advanced editor in BIDS on excel destination to change 'DESCRIPTION' character length manually but as soon as I hit 'OK', it resets to unicode 255.
Could anybody please help me to resolve this issue?
Thanks,
Vishal
So, I did some testing. Excel data transformation is funky but I came up with a solution. I created an excel spreadsheet with fields as needed. I then created fake, dummy data in excel with character length far greater than 255 and hid the row. I then did the SSIS data transformation to the excel spreadsheet which worked. It's a weird and not preferable option but it works.
Problem: Excel only accepts 255 chars per cell when I attempt to use Excel Destination in SSIS (2008 R2) from a sql server table. SalesForce data loader would not accept CSV (with “” text qualifiers) created by
ssis flat file connection manager. SalesForce will only accept CSV (with “” text qualifiers). SalesForce will accept CSV as exported by Excel (2010).
Solution:
1. Create your excel connection manager, set name/path of the destination EXCEL file in your “Excel Destination Data Flow Competent” and map meta-data.
2. Open a new Excel file, remove all extra “sheets”, rename “sheet1” to that was created in step#1, above, select all cells and format to “text”, add all the column header names to the first row of your template sheet. In the columns that need to hold more data than 255 limit, paste in any characters that exceed your limit by 50% (just in case). These columns are now configured to hold your large data. Save the file, naming it something like TEMPLATE_Excel_forLargeCellValues.xlsx
3. Copy this template into your DESTINATION connection: Before your “Excel Destination Data Flow Competent” in the SSIS Control Flow, create a new “File System Task”. Create an ssis pkg level variable to hold the path/filename of your template excel file. In your “File System Task” set “IsSourcePathVariable” = TRUE, set “SourceVariable” to User::Template_Excel. Set “IsDestinationPathVariable” = FALSE, and set “DestinationConnection” = from step #1 above. Set “Operation” = Copy file. “OverwriteDestination”=TRUE. This will now copy your formatted Excel workbook/sheet into your destination folder with the file name you designated in step #1 above and because you put a larger amount of sample data in the columns that require more than 255 chars, all your data will fit.
Note: It is not necessary to delay validation on any components.
You're saying that the excel field is set to 255 right? Changing the SQL field won't have an effect on excel, you'd have to modify the excel file.
I don't believe you can modify the Excel output column to write more than 255 characters. Why not simply write your output to a csv, it can be opened and later modified in Excel anyway.
SSIS excel engine recognizes datatype of first 8 rows and assigns it to excel source or destination automatically. Even defining the excel column as memo wont work. I tried to resolve the error by changing registry value TypeGuessRows of excel engine but it did not work either. So I was not left with any other option but to create a dummy row(2nd row) with more than 255 characters and hide it.Excel source then identify the column with unicode text stream. You have to write some logic in SSIS package to exclude this row if you are trying to import the data from excel. I heard that this issue is resolved in excel versions on and after 2010. But BIDS 2008 does not have option to choose any version after 2007 so this is the only solution if you are working with BIDS 2008 and excel.
You have to select Microsoft Excel 97-2003 and use the xls as file extension in your file name for destination.
I got the same issue of the excel destination not allowing more than 255 characters. After spending almost a day, I tried adding more characters (to simplify, I added spaces more than 255) in the header of the column that has the issue with more than 255 characters. And it magically worked!
You can insert dummy data (260 characters) to under head column you want in your excel (Execute SQL Task)
Script Create and insert
CREATE TABLE `YourSheet` (`myColumn260char` LongText)
GO
INSERT INTO YourSheet(myColumn260char) Values('....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................')
And you can delete dummy row after imported.