Uploading Flat Files

To upload flat files to Birst go to Admin - Define Sources - Upload Files. When you create a new space Birst automatically redirects your browser to this page after creating the space.

For files larger than 20MB or to connect to RDBMS sources, use Birst Connect.

File names longer than 30 characters are not supported for Oracle.

Birst supports the following file formats:

Delimited ASCII text (.csv, .txt) files: Column values are separated by a comma, semicolon, tab, or Cntrl character. The first row should ideally contain the column names. Remove any leading and trailing rows that do not contain data prior to uploading the file.
Microsoft Excel (.xls or .xlsx) files: The first row should ideally contain the column names. Remove any leading and trailing rows that do not contain data prior to uploading the file. Password-protected files are not supported, remove the password protection before uploading.
Microsoft Access database (.mdb or .accdb) files.
ZIP (.zip or .zip64) file with a set of source files in one of the above supported formats. The supported ZIP compression methods are store (no compression) and deflate.

Prior to uploading a flat file

During the upload process, Birst scans your data sources to identify the structure of the sources in terms of column names and types.

A data source should contain data arranged in columns and rows. Avoid empty columns or rows.

Any data source must contain at least two columns. If a source has only one column, Birst will not load it.

By default, Birst interprets the first row of a delimited or Excel file as column headers.

To upload a flat file to a space

On the Home page, select the space where you want to upload data.
Go to Admin - Define Sources - Upload Files.
Click Browse and select the data file to upload.
Click Options to set options such as whether or not the first row contains column names and whether or not Birst should skip loading a set number of leading and trailing rows.
Enter the Column Separator.
This is required for columns separated by a Cntrl character. For Cntrl characters:
1. Verify the Cntrl character by opening the file in an ASCII editor such as Notepad++.
2. Look up the 4-digit ASCII binary code for the character. For example, the Start of Header character, Cntrl-A, is "0001".
3. In the Column Separator field type the ASCII code prefixed with "U". For example, "U0001".

Automatic spaces only: a Process Automatically option displays when you upload data for the first time. Select it to let Birst automatically process the data. See About Data Processing.
Important: Do not use Process Automatically if you have more than one file to upload or if you would like to review the way Birst has uploaded your data.
Click Upload. Uploading your data files may take several minutes or longer depending on the file sizes and your internet connection speed. For Advanced and Discovery space types, when the upload is finished, you see an "Upload Completed" message.
Automatic spaces only: If you have an Automatic space type and have checked the Process Automatically check box, a dialog box in the Process Data tab opens allowing you to indicate how you would like Birst to aggregate column values. You can accept the defaults if you prefer. When you are done selecting your preferences, press Continue. Birst processes the data, then Original Dashboard opens and displays the auto-generated reports.
If you did not check the Process Automatically check box for an Automatic space type, once the data has been uploaded the Process Data page opens. Click the Process Now button to process the data you just uploaded. If you need to upload more data, you can return to the Upload Files page.
In the Process Data dialog box, select the snapshot date for the data upload (this date is used to tag and identify your data load), select the processing group, then click Continue. After the data processes, Birst lists it in the processing history.

Next Steps

If you have an Advanced space type, the next step after uploading your data is to specify the grain of your data sources and the properties of the columns in your sources. These settings determine the dimensional model that Birst will generate from your data sources when you process them.

For Discovery space types, after uploading your data, go to the Data Flow page under the Define Sources tab to create joins between the sources before processing your data.