XSImport - a HANA app for importing CSV's

[paschmann]

During a recent small migration project from a HCP MaxDB DB to a HCP HANA DB I needed to import multiple CSV files, and go through a series of dry runs during the process. Since I was going to be doing the loads multiple times, I decided it would be helpful to write a small front end to make the processes of uploading failrly large CSV files into HANA simpler.

Over the past few months I have heard the question: "Whats the best way to get data into HANA from CSV?" While there are a few options if you have a HANA appliance and system level access to the system, there are not too many options with a HCP instance. After trying/testing the CSV import from Studio (size limit), a hdbti file (not great for multiple/repetitive options/file size challenges) it does not leave you with too many choices. After doing some digging it seems quite a few people have uploaded data through a server side script (XSJS) successfully and using the BATCH option while processing is pretty fast.

So I decided to put a front end together called XSImport - it provides a quick and easy way to load CSV files into HANA using a native XS application. You can find the project on Github here. It has a couple of helpful features like providing a preview of the data set, ability to delete all files already in the table, and a overview of the target table data types and dimensions. Some helpful features if you are going through a similar migration.

Below is a screenshot of the app, if anyone has any suggestions for improvement or would like to contribute to the project, please feel free.

A couple of you might point out and ask why I didn't upload the file directly to the HANA instance? Unfortunately if you are using a HCP HANA instance you don't have access to the file system. If you do, this method from Thomas is still a great option: Importing CSV files into SAP HANA - In-Memory Business Data Management - SCN Wiki

Features:

• Preview data before uploading
• Specify a CSV preview row
• Overwrite option
• Displays target table info (column names, types, sizes)
• Uses BATCH for faster imports
• Can be used for HCP HANA or dedicated HANA instances

Limitations:

• Since files are uploaded via the browser, any browser size POST limitations come into effect
• Network speed to HCP or HANA will effect the file upload speed