Oracle Fusion Technical: Reports, Data, Integrations and Extensions · Module 8 · HDL for HCM data
The .dat file format
Lesson 78 of 177 · 2 min
A .dat file is pipe-delimited, metadata-first, and unforgiving about column order. THE HEADER LINE GOVERNS EVERYTHING BELOW IT. It declares the business object, the operation, and then names every attribute in the order the data lines will supply them. The data lines carry values positionally against that header — so an extra pipe, a missing pipe, or a column named in a different order changes what every value below means. Reading one. Find the METADATA line, read the attribute names left to right, and map them onto the first data line. Do that on paper for one record before loading a file you did not write; it takes two minutes and it is the only way to know what the file actually says. Writing one. Generate rather than type: export the object's attributes from the application, or start from an extract of an existing record, so the header is correct…
The full lesson is part of the course
The video, the complete written lesson and the module quiz are included in Oracle Fusion Technical: Reports, Data, Integrations and Extensions, with a certificate on completion and a fourteen-day refund window.
In this module: Module 8 · HDL for HCM data
- 1Why HCM has its own loader
- 2The .dat file format
- 3Business objects and their dependencies
- 4Effective dates: the part that catches everyone
- 5Source keys and matching existing records
- 6Loading, monitoring and the error report
- 7Corrections and the delete you cannot do
- 8HDL versus HSDL, and when to use each
- 9What breaks: four HCM load failures
- 10Lab briefing · Load a workforce, then correct it