We have been using workbooks in a variety of capacities. One of these usages is to handle requests for data extracts or reports. Typically these involve someone from IT writing some queries and/or creating some lists. We've been using workbooks to handle these requests (basically 1 per request). The nice thing about these is that they're a little lighter-weight then making a big tree of true subfolders. Keeping each project is a separate container is nice so queries/lists dont stomp on each other too.
I'm pushing to have the group do query development on our test server. Workbooks dont by default have the 'folder management UI' available; however, you can still get to it. This is a backdoor way to export a folder archive for that workbooks. However, if you try to re-import this archive into a new workbook, the pipeline job just sits on the 'waiting' stage. I havent looked into detail where this gets blocked, but I had a couple general questions on the design of import/export:
1) is there any philosophical reason why workbooks cant be imported/exported, or is it just a matter of no one asking for the feature?
2) folder import typically involves creating the folder first, and then importing the archive. the archive is really more like 'folder config'. is there any reason 'create folder' couldnt be part of this?
I ask b/c I'm pondering whether I want to try to make an 'import workbook from archive' function, which would be available from the parent folder. |
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| jeckels responded: |
2013-05-17 15:27 |
Hi Ben,
1. Nope, no philosophical reason, just not a usage scenario in the original design. I could imagine being able to export workbooks individually, or to include them all (or a subset) when exporting the parent folder.
2. I could easily see import being part of the Create Folder workflow and/or the Create Workbook workflow. It's sort of like being able to create a new folder based on an existing "template" folder.
Thanks,
Josh |
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| adam responded: |
2013-05-17 15:39 |
1) No philosophical reason why workbooks can't be imported/exported... it's just, at the moment, there's only one person in the world using them regularly
2) Again, no reason not to add the option to create on import. Current behavior has evolved from the "study reload" scenario (original impetus for all this functionality), so the assumption that you're updating an existing folder has remained. We do create folders when we import hierarchical archives (those that include subfolders). Just need to make sure the import UI is clear... replacing current folder contents vs. creating a new subfolder... and perhaps giving the option to give it a new name (and handling name conflicts).
Where do you think the individual workbook export UI would live? Button on the workbooks webpart grid?
It also seems like folder export should have the additional option to export workbooks.
Adam |
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| Ben Bimber responded: |
2013-05-17 15:49 |
i havent thought very hard on this, but yes, i was thinking maybe these would be buttons added to the workbooks webpart. i look over the code this morning, and it looks like most pieces could get re-used pretty easily. i was guessing that import/export would only work for 1 workbook at a time. that's not ideal, but fits what i need it to do.
PS: only 1 person using workbooks?? |
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