CSV-based bulk update functionality

[bhunt64848]

NetBox version

v2.10.4

Feature type

Change to existing functionality

Proposed functionality

Being able to import serial numbers or any given field without having the export delete and re-import would be absolute amazing (wanted to add 45 serial numbers and couldn’t do it)

Use case

Provide efficiency in mass updating the database

Database changes

No response

External dependencies

No response

[DanSheps]

I think a better way to phrase this would be "bulk update via import"

[bhunt64848]

Agreed!

[Mizarv]

This has already been suggsted in #1732 with a reply from Jeremy.

Given it was 4 years ago, I would love to see this looked at again.

[jeremystretch]

I'm afraid this needs quite a bit more detail. What is the proposed workflow? How will you accurately identify existing objects?

[Mizarv]

I guess now that we can export the CSVs with the object ID you could use that as that field can't be updated.

Maybe an additional tab to avoid complicating the existing CSV Data method as this works excellently

[martinum4]

Maybe it could the same as the normal csv import in regard to attribute extension and selection, example:

device.id,serial,asset_tag 
500,0815,47111234

would be used to update the serial and asset tags for the device with ID 500.
However it could also be like

device,serial,asset_tag 
TestDevice,0815,47111234

since the name is an unique identifier too.

The next page could be similar to the interface-renaming screen where the prechange and postchange-data for each device is displayed, that way it could be avoided to update already set fields.

[jeremystretch]

Implementing this would require an absolutely reliable unique object identifier, i.e. the object's primary key (numeric ID). If that's acceptable, I think this is reasonably feasible to implement. However, it would likely require a separate view and workflow from the bulk import function, as we would be updating objects rather than creating them, and none of the form fields would be required (similar to the existing bulk edit functionality).

[github-actions]

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