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How To: Upload Checkbox and Multi-Select fields

Overview:

Checkbox and multi-select fields require some additional data preparation in order to upload into TreePlotter™. This article details the process of preparing these fields to be uploaded into TreePlotter.

Prerequisites:

Topics covered in this tutorial:

  • Preparing the file
  • Crosswalk

Preparing the file:

If the field you are uploading the data to is a Checkbox or Multi-Select field you will need to use a CSV file and follow these steps to upload the data. We will use the example field Tree Work-Pruning, but any Checkbox or Multi-Select field will work the same. Ensure there is a value in the Tree Work-Pruning options for each value in the CSV file.

Example Tree Work-Pruning in the Data Field Editor

The column for Tree Work-Pruning in the CSV file will have all the values in one column. In order for the data to be properly added to TreePlotter each Tree Work-Pruning value will need to have its own column in the CSV. The best way to start this is to highlight the entire heading row by selecting the 1 in the left most column. Then click on Sort & Filter in the Toolbar and select Filter. This will put a filter on each column.

Example Turn on filter for the header row

Insert a new column for each value in the CSV and populate the corresponding cell with an ‘X’ or ‘True’ value. The easy way to do this is to add the new column and name it something that will help you understand which option this will be cross walked to keeping the 10 character column name limit. Then click on the filter and deselect all by clicking on select all and select only the value that matches the newly added column. The spreadsheet will show only the rows that have the selected value.

If there are many rows that have this value put an X in the first 3 rows and highlight those rows, then double click or drag the small square in the right corner to populate the X’s to the end of the list.

Repeat this for each value in the filter. If you have more than one multi-select or checkbox field to upload it will help to use the first character or two of the checkbox field name first in the column header for each option to help you determine which field this option is for and that will put all the checkbox options more consecutively in the uploader.

Crosswalk

The crosswalk step of the uploader distinguishes checkbox and multi-select fields with a green outline in the Destination column(right). The source data column(left) shows each column in the upload data as a different box, so each Tree Work-Pruning value will have its own box in the Source data. Choose the first column you created with the X values on the left and Tree Work-Pruning on the right. Then click on the arrow between the columns.

Drag the ‘X’ or ‘True’ value to the corresponding Tree Work-Pruning value. The box on the right side of the screen will track all the mappings, so use it to track the crosswalk progress. Then click Done with this field and confirm. Once all Tree Work-Pruning columns have been mapped to the corresponding option in the Tree Work-Pruning field, continue with any other fields and upload as normal.

Updated on May 4, 2024