Resolving import issues in VoiceObjects

Introduction

This article will describe how to get more information on the cause for error messages and warnings when the import of a VoiceObjectsXML or ExportXML file fails.
The online help of VoiceObjects contains a detailed description of the Import/Export in general - see Export and Import Objects in chapter 7 - Basic Commands of the respective Desktop Guide (Desktop for Web Guide or Desktop for Eclipse Guide).

This article is limited to describe several common patterns why imports into VoiceObjects fail.

Import File Formats:

Successful import

Under normal circumstances VoiceObjects will try to import all objects. In case a conflict occurs usually the object name will be changed prior to aborting the import.

Thus please check your project after importing a file into an existing project (e.g. when merging the work from different developers) if there are object names containing the timestamp of the import. This check should be done even when no message occurred during the import.

Additionally it is always helpful to check the import logs for any warnings which might have ocurred during the import - see Import Errors for the logfile location.

Import Errors

In case the import fails an error message is shown.

The next step should be to check the latest messages in the SRV_ObjectImportExport.log file of VoiceObjects Desktop. The file should be reachable in VoiceObjects Desktop - in Desktop for Web open the log view under View - Desktop Logging. In Desktop for Eclipse the logs are available in the Desktop Logs tab of the Control Center.
The logfile should show you the object(s) which caused the import to fail - as well as the message(s) describing the failure.

Usually you will have the following causes for an import failure:

• Name conflict
  The object name needs to be unique for one object type only. VoiceObjects will try to resolve naming conflicts for you in case they occur. Usually a new object is created in case there is a name conflict - the new object will then contain the timestamp attached to the object name.
• Reference ID conflict
  The Reference ID is the unique ID for an object in the project version. It can be set manually in the object - e.g. when the object needs to be referenced by a variable in the initial URL. In case of conflicts the import will be stopped, an error message is shown in the logs. Reference ID conflicts need to be resolved, VoiceObjects has no means to resolve them automatically.
• GUID conflict
  The GUID is the general ID for an object within a VoiceObjects repository. It is unique for a complete metadata repository. Thus when an object is imported with the same GUID but the object is of a different type the import fails. Note: This should not happen unless you manually edit the VoiceObjectsXML as VoiceObjects will assign unique GUIDs to each object.When you choose "Generate new ID for all imported objects" in the Import dialog, every object in the import file will get a new GUID - and thus objects with the same type and GUID are not replaced (what might lead to Reference ID conflicts).
• Reference ID naming convention violated
  In older versions of VoiceObjects Reference IDs were handled less restrictive as in newer versions. One example is that in old versions of VoiceObjects a Reference ID could contain a space (" ") or a hyphen ("-"). This is no longer allowed. Usually VoiceObjects will try to automatically fix this.The regular expression for the allowed Reference ID content looks like the following: [a-zA-Z][A-Za-z0-9_:]*In case the Reference ID was not changed from the original one (0.8.11:OVAP?) this is recognized and accepted also.

Please see additionally the import schema below: