The Bulk Upload tool can either be run from the command line by passing it the path to an Xml manifest file that contains uploading directions, or it can be run as an interactive Windows application. If you run it as a Windows application then you can configure your upload information then save it as an Xml manifest file. With that file you can either perform the upload unattended and/or use it as a template for other bulk uploads.  This page contains information about both Bulk Upload 1.1 for SharePoint 2003 and Bulk Upload 2007 for SharePoint 2007.  Items that only apply to the 2007 version are marked with a red asterisk (*).

Running Interactive

To upload documents, set metadata or save an Xml upload manifest do the following:

1. Type in the Url to the portal Area or Windows SharePoint Services site that contains the document library to which you want to upload documents in the Portal or Site Url edit box.
2. *If you want to connect to the SharePoint site using a different set of credentials, enter them in the Alternate Credentials section near the bottom of the screen.  Those credentials will be used when retrieving data as well as when uploading data.
3. Click the Get DocLibs button. It will retrieve a list of all the document libraries it finds at the Url and put them in the DocLibs dropdown.
4. Select the document library from the dropdown list to which you want to upload documents.
5. If you want to set metadata on the documents then click the Set Metadata Properties button. It then retrieves a list of all the public metadata fields from the document libary and populates the grid.
6. Edit any metadata default values you want to use in the grid.
7. If you want to upload documents click the Browse... button and locate the source directory from which files should be uploaded.
8. Check off the appropriate options for the type of transfer you want to make:

• Include subfolders from the source location
• Recreate the folder structure from the source to the destination document library
• Set metadata on the items
• ONLY set metadata on items, but not upload them

Once you've completed these steps if you click on the Save button then you will be prompted to provide a location and file name where an Xml manifest of this transfer can be saved. If you click the Process button then the transfer will begin using the values you have configured.

*Bulk Upload 2007 will also attempt to replace characters that SharePoint does not support when it creates new folders or uploads files.  By default, all illegal characters will be replaced with underscores.  If you wish to change the mapping for any illegal characters click the the Illegal Character Mapping button. A dialog will appear where you can change the mapping for each individual illegal character.  To save your changes click the OK button; to discard them click the Cancel button.

Running Unattended

To run Bulk Upload unattended you just need to start the executable with one parameter - the name of an Xml manifest file containing the description of the upload. For details on how to create this please run the tool in interactive mode, set your configuration options, then save the results to a manifest file.

Working Through Upload Failures

Bulk Upload 2007 includes a configuration file called sdUpload2007.exe.config.  It contains a parameter called MaxFailures, which is set to 10 by default.  What that means is that Bulk Upload 2007 encounters an error when uploading a file, it will continue uploading files until it reaches the value in the MaxFailures parameter.  To be able to continue uploading files after an error, you just need to set this value to a higher number.  The maximum value this parameter can be set to is 2,147,483,647.  If you change this value and Bulk Upload 2007 is already running, you must close it and restart it for the new values to take effect.