Assets and IP Devices can be imported into IMS from Excel in bulk via the Bulk Import from Excel panel found in the Manage tab.

A template for the bulk import can be obtained by clicking the ‘Download example’ link within the panel. 

Excel file layout

The Excel file for the Bulk Import can contain three things: Assets, IP Devices, and locations for Assets. 

Assets and locations

The data for an Asset consists of a name and a type. The type field includes a dynamic data dropdown to allow you to pick from the list of supported types. The list of supported Asset Types is also available on the Support Data sheet.
 

Note that every Asset must have a unique name in the system.

An asset can also have a location specified in Latitude / Longitude format but it is not required.

When the Bulk Import is completed these Assets will be created in IMS if they do not already exist. 

IP Devices

The data for an IP Device consists of a name, a device type, and either an IP Address or a hostname. The type field includes a dynamic data dropdown to allow you to pick from the list of supported types. The list of supported IP Device Types is also available on the Support Data sheet.

Whilst IP Devices can have duplicate names, they must have a unique IP Address or hostname specified. You cannot create two IP Devices that share a hostname or IP Address.

The fields for this data in the Excel file are referred to as “Child” IP Device Name, and “Child” IP Device Type, etc. This is because the IP Device that is created from this data will be attached to the Asset specified in the columns to the left in the spreadsheet. In IMS terminology that means the Asset to the left will be the parent Asset for the IP Device.

In the example below, the avi01 IP Device will be created as a child of the asset DT0001; and avi02 will be created as a child of the asset DT0002. 

Multiple IP Devices can also be attached to the same Asset. In the example below, avi01 and avi02 will both be created as child IP Devices attached to asset DT0001, and avi03 will be attached to asset DT0002.

When the Bulk Import is completed these IP Devices will be created in IMS.

Completing the Bulk Import

Once the data has been entered into the spreadsheet you can attempt to import it into IMS via the Bulk Import From Excel panel.  

You can either drag & drop the file onto the panel or click the upload file section to open a file browser. 

After the file is uploaded a test run of the import will be done to identify any issues in the data; the data will not actually be imported into the system until you confirm the changes.

In the example below a spreadsheet was imported but two of the IP Devices shared an IP Address. You can see that the import has detected this error and reported it. You can, however, choose to ignore the error and import the data regardless. In this case the duplicated IP Device would not be imported but the other Assets and IP Devices would be.

To complete the import and enter the data into IMS select Yes and the bulk import will be complete.