DSpace CSV Archive

Takes a simple CSV spreadsheet, and a bunch of files and magically turns them into the DSpace Simple Archive format.

Some simple rules:

• The first row should be your header, which defines the values you're going to provide.
• Only one column is mandatory: 'files'. Files can be organized in any way you want, just provide the proper path relative to the CSV file's location.
• This fork supports the assignment of collections to items. You need the handle of the respective collection. Have a look at the file template.csv for examples.
• Add one column for each metadata element (eg: dc.title)
• The order of the columns does not matter.
• Only dublin core metadata elements are supported (for now).
• Use the fully qualified dublin core name for each element (eg dc.contributor.author).
• Languages can be specified with the language label in brackets after the element (see template.csv for examples) leaving a space after the element name and then listing the language.
• Separate multiple values for an element by double-pipes (||).
• If your metadata value has a comma in it, put some quotes around it. Eg: "Roses are red, violets are blue".

An Example:

files	collections	dc.title en	dc.contributor.author en	dc.subject	dc.type
something1.pdf||something_else1.pdf	123456789/11||123456789/12	title 1	author 1	subject 1	Report
directory/something2.pdf	123456789/1	"title 2, with comma"	author 2a||author 2b	subject 2	Article

Usage ./dspace-csv-archive /path/to/input/file.csv

Importing into DSpace

If it is not already, the directory should be placed in a location that the dspace user can access it and write to the directory. I recommend putting the directory into /home/dspace/imported-data/ and leaving it there so the mapfile can be easily found if it is needed later, e.g. to remove or modify imported data. One way to do this is

sudo cp -r [directory-name] /home/dspace/imported-data/
sudo chown -R dspace:dspace /home/dspace/imported-data/[directory-name]

Now we are ready to use the import command that comes with DSpace. Be sure to run this command as the dspace user. Something like

[dspace]/bin/dspace import --add --eperson=[importer's email address] --collection=[collection handle] --source=[directory-name] --mapfile=[directory-name]/mapfile

will add the items in the directory to the requested collection. Please refer to the DSpace documentation for more information about the DSpace Simple Archive Format or the import/export commands.

The --mapfile argument is particularly important, and the file that gets generated should be kept along with the rest of the source directory. This file is required for deleting or modifying the imported files using the command-line tools.

.exe file

The directory dist contains a Windows executable. This was created with PyInstaller and the following command:

pyinstaller -F dspace-csv-archive.py