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ASCII text files contain data in a standard data interchange format supported by most systems. ASCII text files are normally created with a .TXT extension. Information in an ASCII file is stored using character representations of all data. This means that numeric information and text information are stored in the same manner. There are no separators that mark the end of each field. Each record within a text file is terminated with an End-of-Record (EOR) marker. The EOR marker used for the Windows operating system is the hex character 0D0A. The EOR marker used for the UNIX operating system is the hex character 0A.

To import ASCII text files, you must indicate the exact position of each character and the number of characters assigned to each data field. This information is entered in the Position and Length fields for each data item in the Import Field Properties window. The position and length information must be specified for each data item, regardless of whether the item is a string-type or numeric-type item.

Because there are no markers to indicate the positions of each field, it is critical that the exact position and length of each field is specified. The field positions must be consistent for all records within a file.

 

 Importing ASCII Text Files Example

 

The following ASCII text file contains customer information. The numbered line indicates the character position within the record.

---------1---------2---------3---------4---------5-------------

01ABC Customer Name  01Y05/31/2010 100.00

The Customer Name field is located at character position 10 and is 30 characters long. The Last Activity Date field is located at position 40 and is 6 characters long. The Customer Balance field starts at position 50 and is 10 characters long.

Because there are no markers to indicate the positions of each field, it is critical that the exact position and length of each field is specified. The field positions must be consistent for all records within a file.

The following data items must be selected to import the above file into the Customer master file (AR_Customer).

Item Name	Type	Operation	Col/Pos	Length	Mask/Value
AR_DivisionNo	S	REPL	0001	0002	00
CustomerNo	S	REPL	0003	0007
CustomerName	S	REPL	0010	0030
TermsCode	S	REPL	0040	0002	00
OpenItemCustomer	Y	REPL	0042	0001	Y
DateLastActivity	D	REPL	0043	0010	MM/DD/YYYY
BalanceForward	N	REPL	0053	0010	#,###,###,###.00-

 

For more information, see Import File Types.