Fiedler Data Tools

Fiedler Data Tools are two companion apps for the IBM Maximo Application Suite (MAS). They move data between IBM Maximo Manage and Excel workbooks. Fiedler Data Import brings a workbook into Manage, and Fiedler Data Export writes Manage records into a workbook.

Both apps are built from the same parts. They read and write one workbook format, they run the same way beside Manage, and they share one version number and one licence. This page holds what is true for both. Each app has its own page and its own series of articles.

The two apps

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• Fiedler Data Import imports Excel workbooks into Manage. It plans every row before it writes, and it writes as you, with your own rights.
• Fiedler Data Export exports Manage records into workbooks of the same format. It reads as you, and it only reads.

One workbook format

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The export writes the format that the import reads. So you export records, change them in Excel, and import the workbook again, with no conversion in between. Both apps use the same workbook engine, so a workbook means the same to both.

The same format serves more than the round trip. An export layout gives an empty import template, and a library of import workbooks from Maximo 7 keeps working on MAS.

What both apps share

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• Sign-in through MAS. People sign in with their MAS account and work in the browser. Each app works with the user’s own rights in Manage, so a user sees and changes only what Manage allows.
• A companion app beside Manage. Each app is a container in the MAS cluster on OpenShift, next to Manage. No Java code goes into Manage, and no existing Maximo application changes.
• A small footprint in Manage. Each app needs a few automation scripts and its own application for the rights. Its administration screen installs them, and the same screen removes them again.
• Settings and monitoring. An administrator controls each app through settings in a ConfigMap, and both apps serve metrics for Prometheus.
• One version. Both apps carry the same version number and are released together. They run on MAS 9.1 and later.

Running them

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The last article of each series is for the people who run the app:

• Running and scripting Fiedler Data Import: install, metrics, backup, the command line and test suites.
• Running Fiedler Data Export: install and removal, nightly exports, retention and monitoring.

Guides that hold for both apps appear below this page as they are published.

Editions

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Fiedler Data Import and Fiedler Data Export share one licence: the licence of Fiedler Data Tools. Products that join the family later come under the same licence.

• The free edition needs no licence and has no time limit. An import takes up to 200 rows of each sheet, and an export writes up to 200 records. The plan shows before the run what the limit leaves out. Up to three users may use each app: every active user who reaches the app in Manage through a security group counts once. The command line client and scheduled exports need a licence. In the free edition every page ends with a footer that says so. Every export file and every result workbook of an import ends with a sheet named Fiedler Data Tools. It names the limit and what the limit left out, and it links to the product page and to us.
• A licence is per customer, covers import and export together, lifts the row limits, and names how many users may use each app. Its price is per user and month. Unless the order says otherwise, we invoice a year in advance. An administrator installs the licence on the app’s administration screen, and it takes effect at once. The same screen lists the users who count. A licensed app writes no Fiedler Data Tools sheet.
• A trial licence unlocks every feature for a limited time. Ask us for one.

Prices are on request. Get in touch for a price, for a trial licence, or to see both apps on your own data. We work in English and German.

IBM and Maximo are trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation, registered in many jurisdictions worldwide.