If your institution has over 20 users or over five groups, setting up your institution manually will quickly become cumbersome. Luckily, there are several areas in the Institution Admin dashboard where you can upload a spreadsheet saved as a .csv file to create or change data. This method is a great way to add or update lots of users and groups simultaneously. Below, we’ll walk through creating these spreadsheets and common mistakes that can result in uploading errors. 

Make sure you have access to Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets, or another simple spreadsheet management software before continuing. 

Creating a CSV - User Upload

The user upload CSV is the easiest to create, and will allow you to create multiple user accounts simultaneously. All you’ll need are the names and email addresses for each new user. 

1. Open your spreadsheet software and add four headers -- email, name, password, and sis_id. Your spreadsheet should now look like this:
   
    The headers must match exactly what you see here - using “Name” instead of “name” or “Email Address” instead of “email,” for example, will cause the upload to fail. 

2. Add each user’s email address under the email column, each user's name under the name column, and if you choose to add passwords for these users, add their passwords under the password column. If the user has a sis id number, add it under the sis_id column. The spreadsheet will now look something like this:
   

3. Save the spreadsheet as a .csv file.

Creating a CSV - Group Upload 

The group upload CSV is somewhat more complicated than the user upload CSV because it allows you to create groups, create users, and add users to specific groups at the same time. You’ll need to know the names, email addresses, role (instructor or student) of each user, sis id numbers, the names of each group, and which users should be in which group(s). 

1. Open your spreadsheet software and add six headers - group_name, name, email, password, user_type, and sis_id. The spreadsheet should now look like this:
   
   The headers must match exactly what you see here - using "Group Name" instead of "group name" or "User Password" instead of "password", for example, will cause the upload to fail. 
2. Put the name of the first group you’re creating/editing under the “group_name” header. In that same row, add the user information for one of the users who will need to be in this group. In the “user_type” column, enter “instructor” or “student” based on this user’s role. 
   1. If the group name you add does not match an existing group in the institution, this will create a new group. 
   2. If the user information you add does not match an existing user in the institution, this will create a new user. 
   3. If the group name matches an existing group in the institution, the upload will add this user to that group. 
   4. If the user information matches an existing user in the institution, the upload will add the existing user to the group. 
3. Repeat step 2 for all of the users that will be in this group. 
4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 for any additional groups/users you’re managing in this upload.
5. The spreadsheet should now look similar to this:
   
6. Save the spreadsheet as a .csv file.   

 CSV Troubleshooting

If your CSV upload fails, or a particular row of the CSV fails to import, check the file for errors. 

1. Make sure the header names are not incorrect (i.e. “Password” instead of “password” or “User Name” instead of “name”). 
2. Make sure all of the headers are in the spreadsheet, even if you’re not including optional information (i.e. the “password” header should still be in the spreadsheet even if you elect not to set passwords for the users in the sheet). 
3. Make sure the headers are in the order shown in the uploading instructions. 
4. Make sure the file is in the .csv format. When you attempt to save a spreadsheet as a CSV, the following message will pop up - ignore it and continue.
   
5. Check that each row has all the required fields filled in - adding a name for a user but not including an email address, for example, will cause an error. 
6. Check that none of the cells in the spreadsheet include “special” characters, such as accented letters, emojis, or the � symbol. If you copy and paste information into the spreadsheet from another application, this process may add special characters to your text that are invisible in the spreadsheet itself. Best practice is to type all information directly into the spreadsheet. 
7. Make sure the spreadsheet does not include any formatting that is not your software’s default. Including colored fonts, shaded or highlighted cells, or bolded text may cause errors. 
8. Make sure there are no spaces left after any information in any cell. For example, entering “[email protected] “ instead of “[email protected]” will cause an error. 
9. If you chose to provide passwords for your users, make sure they are all eight or more characters.