Import CSV only updates first 5 posts

[Ethan Wilson]

I have a master csv file that will eventually contain thousands of events. I would like to be able to reimport this file whenever an event changes and have it update all of the events that are already in the system, as well as create any new events since the last import. It appears that this should be the default functionality.

However, when I reimport the csv file, it updates the first 5 events and then creates new events from the remaining rows…regardless of whether they are already in the system or not. It doesn’t matter if I use my own or the example one on this page https://theeventscalendar.com/knowledgebase/csv-files-options-and-examples/.

I’ve tried updating my csv file/checking for errors and double checking the import settings to make sure it’s set to overwrite any changes from the original source.

We’re currently testing this on a beta server and not on the live server.

Are there any suggestions on how to fix this?

[Sky]

Hi Ethan,

I’m sorry to hear that you’re having issues importing events. I will try to help you get this sorted.

Can you tell me what type of changes are being introduced to the events that are being duplicated? Any changes to the event title? Do these events occur in the past or future?

Also, have you tried this with other plugins disabled and using the Twenty Seventeen theme? If you don’t have a staging site, you can use a plugin like WP Staging to quickly create one for testing. For more information about the testing process, please see our Testing for Conflicts Guide.

Thanks,
Sky

[Ethan Wilson]

All of the events I was importing previously were last years events. When I updated them to future events, it seemed to fix the issue of the plugin only updating the first 5 events.

Now I have a question about updating events. It works fine when I edit things like the event description. If I wanted to update the time of the event in the CSV, it creates a new event instead of updating the old event. I’m assuming that the import uses the title, date, and time to determine if the event is already in the database.

It defeats the point of having master csv file if editing the most important details (the title/time) cause a new event to be created instead of updating the original. I’m afraid the only way to get this to work is to import, then export using a plugin like WP All Export (so that each event has it’s ID), then reimporting that file if any changes are made. Are there any other suggestions on how to make this work? That seems incredibly unintuitive and also defeats the point of having a master csv file.

[Sky]

Ethan,

Thank you for the additional details. The behavior you describe is indeed not the way importing should work. I was able to reproduce the events duplicating after re-importing with a different date or time. I have found a bug ticket for this, and am attaching this thread to it. While I can tell you that this is something being worked on, I cannot provide a timeline for when the fix will be completed. Once it is fixed, someone will follow back here with you to make sure it is working for you following the update.

Thanks again for reporting this, and please let us know if you have any other questions or issues in the meantime.

Thanks,
Sky

[Victor]

Hi Ethan!

Just wanted to share with you that a new release of our plugins is out, including a the tribe_events_import_event_duplicate_matches filter that facilitates the addition of some matching rules to prevent duplicates.

Find out more about this release → https://theeventscalendar.com/maintenance-release-week-15-april-2018/

Please update the plugins and let us know if the fix works for your site.

Best,
Victor

[Support Droid]

Hey there! This thread has been pretty quiet for the last three weeks, so we’re going to go ahead and close it to avoid confusion with other topics. If you’re still looking for help with this, please do open a new thread, reference this one and we’d be more than happy to continue the conversation over there.

Thanks so much!
The Events Calendar Support Team

[Author]

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