IBM DOORS how to import rows from excel to specific place in DOORS - ibm-doors

Question

I have some rows in DOORS identified by a number. For example
Object Identifier
Description
1
description of object 1
2
description of object 2
3
description of object 3
4
description of object 4
I know if I want to modify an existing object, I just import an excel that has the columns Object Identifier and Description with the same number in the Object Identifier column, as the object I want to modify.
If I want to create new objects, I import rows with empty Object Identifier column. They get the identifier assigned automatically and will be inserted in the bottom of the table in DOORS.
But I want to modify some existing objects and create a new object specifically under the second object.
Object Identifier
Description
1
modified description of object 1
2
description of object 2
5
new object
3
modified description of object 3
4
description of object 4
How can I do this in one import?

Answer 1

I'm not aware of an official support for this. One method could be to have an additional column called e.g. "below". In this column, the excel editor might enter the object number of the parent object.
Then, after you imported your excel to DOORS, you would run a code like this, which moves every object where "below" is set, below the referenced parent object
Object o
Module m = edit … (or current or whatever)
Skip sk = create
for o in m do {
put sk, o, o
}
for o in sk do {
int iBelow = intOf realOf (o."below""")
if (iBelow) {
move o, below object iBelow
o."below" = ""
}
}
save m

Answer 2

As far as I remember while screwing up a whole DOORS module, when you select to import (the excel file in a csv format), you can choose to update or create.
If you pick update, it will ask for the column with unique identifiers (usually, the object IDs column) and for the objects that doesn't have a number, they will be created, updating the ones that do have an ID, but (as you state in the question) the new ones will be added at the bottom.
Now, we are only using the ID attribute of the objects, which makes them unique even if is moved, deleted or flushed, but for the meaning of sorting, that attribute is meaningless, because if you copy an object (from the same module or from another) the ID updates to the next available according to the ones in the module.
The attribute that tells DOORS how to structure and sort the objects, is actually the Object Number
"... hierarchical ..." is the keyword here. That attribute tells DOORS the order of the objects and which is parent/children of which.
Now, I don't really remember if that attribute can be modified in the csv, but there are two DXL scripts that combined, enable that while importing:
\IBM\Rational\DOORS\X.Y\lib\dxl\example\oslc\ hierarchy.dxl
\IBM\Rational\DOORS\X.Y\lib\dxl\standard\import\ commas.dxl
Unfortunatelly, I couldn't find the combined script, but I know it uses those 2 (some time ago I was making the DXL to do almost the same as you want, but someone else at my work managed to do it first and with time, it was no longer necessary)
Here is the reference manual (image is from page 402/1006)
And this page has some good scripts, too.
I hope my answer helps you to build that script (or find some coworkers that do it before you do, hehe)