Import Room Schedule

Imagine this scenario: you've received a room schedule in Excel, but you really want to use the powerful sign programming and reporting tools in SignAgent Pro™.
This tutorial will teach you how to use the "Import Room Schedule" Script in SignAgent Pro™ 3.0.
This will allow you to import room schedules from Excel spreadsheets or other databases.

1. Prepare Excel Spreadsheet

Before we can import our existing message schedule, we have to prepare the spreadsheet we already have.
This is done by ensuring that the first row contains logical titles or headings for each column.

In this example, I've separated out the Sign Type, Floor, Location Number, Message, Phase, and Status

2. Import Room Schedule

1. Go to the SIGN table
2. Go to File > Import Room Schedule
3. Select file to import from

3. Match Fields to Import

Here you want to match up the fields from your Excel spreadsheet to your FileMaker database.

A field is matched using the arrow from Source Field (Excel) to Target Field (FileMaker)

You'll notice that I've matched up:
Sign Type (in Excel) to Type (FileMaker)
Floor (Excel) to Level (FileMaker)
etc...

Since there was no Excel column to match with Notes, Client Notes, or Internal Notes, etc. I have marked those with Don't import this field (two dots)

You can switch from the arrow to the dots by clicking on the arrow (or the dots)

You can rearrange the list on the right (to match fields) by clicking and dragging.

Ensure that the following are also marked properly:

Add new records
Don't import first record (contains field names)

4. Identify First Sign

A dialog box will now pop up identify the first sign that FileMaker wants to import.
If you checked the Don't import first record box in the previous step, then this should be your first sign, and you can click Sign

Complete!

The room schedule from your Excel spreadsheet has now been imported into SignAgent Pro™!

Synchronization Note

NOTE: If you add signs to FileMaker and then synchronize, InDesign will place these signs in 1" x 1" boxes at the top-left corner of your active page. You will need to adjust these and move them to their proper locations. See steps 4 & 5 of this tutorial here for more details on that: Creating a Sign in FileMaker