asked on

Import Contacts into Outlook 2003 from CSV

Currently I have a CSV file, non-standard headers sadly (as in ADDR1 instead of Address1), and I need it to import each record into Outlook as a contact.

I can do it manually but I want to do it using VB.NET (Visual Studio 2005 if it matters).

I know there are better ways but what I was considering was to read the CSV into an array and split the records up. Then put that into Outlook.

You would just Loop this for each record I assume:
Dim olApp As Outlook.Application
olApp = CreateObject("Outlook.Application")
Dim olNs As Outlook.NameSpace
olNs = olApp.GetNamespace("MAPI")
olNs.Logon()
Dim olItem As Outlook.ContactItem
olItem = olApp.CreateItem(olContactItem)
With olItem
.FullName = Name
.Birthday = BDay
.CompanyName = Company
.HomeTelephoneNumber = Phone
.Email1Address = Email
.JobTitle = Job
.HomeAddress = ADDR
End With
olItem.Save()

The problem I have is loading the CSV and splitting it up into variables that I can loop through.
Also the actual data I need is only Name, Company, and Phone number. The rest is just a bonus. I'm eventually going to schedule this to happen weekly, no Forms needed just a Console App.

Brian Mulder

Hi BiSHGoD,
----------

a few weeks ago i wrote a few scripts on this site doing this and a bit more, but they are VBS so you can add them to the task scheduler

for the fun of it [well almost] this is your console vb.net version based on c:\contacts.csv
you don't need the headers but add the fields based on the column in the csv
didn't add robust error handling only a simple try catch and a finally to clean up
if you test it on a copy of your data first, and compile it into an exe you can add it to the task scheduler for automatic runs

---
Imports System.IO

Module Module1

Sub Main()
Dim objNS As Object, oOlFolder As Object, objOutlook As Object
Dim myItems As Object, objContact As Object

Const olFolderContacts = 10

Try

objOutlook = CreateObject("Outlook.Application")
objNS = objOutlook.GetNamespace("MAPI")
oOlFolder = objNS.GetDefaultFolder(olFolderContacts) ' this will add them to the default contacts
myItems = oOlFolder.Items

Dim strContact() As String
Dim strLine As String
If System.IO.File.Exists("c:\contacts.csv") Then
Dim objstreamreader As StreamReader = System.IO.File.OpenText("test.txt")
strLine = objstreamreader.ReadLine
Do Until strLine Is Nothing

strContact = strLine.Split(",")
objContact = myItems.Add("IPM.Contact.CTXContacts")
objContact.FullName = strContact(0)
objContact.CompanyName = strContact(1)
objContact.Email1Address = strContact(2)
objContact.BusinessTelephoneNumber = strContact(3)
objContact.HomeTelephoneNumber = strContact(4)
objContact.BusinessFaxNumber = strContact(5)
objContact.MobileTelephoneNumber = strContact(6)
objContact.BusinessAddress = strContact(7)
objContact.Department = strContact(8)
objContact.OfficeLocation = strContact(9)
objContact.ManagerName = strContact(10)
objContact.Body = strContact(11)
objContact.Save()

strLine = objstreamreader.ReadLine()
Loop
objstreamreader.Close()
End If

Catch ex As Exception
MsgBox(ex.Message)

Finally
myItems = Nothing
oOlFolder = Nothing
objNS = Nothing
objOutlook = Nothing
objContact = Nothing
End Try

End Sub

End Module
---

----------
bruintje
share what you know, learn what you don't

BiSHGoD

ASKER

Sorry, been a bit busy that I forgot to respond.

That code snippet didn't work in my environment. I already have some vb.net code, above, and would have liked to build on that.

Consequently I did figure out how to code it myself in VB.NET.

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

GranMod

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