Splitting https://ideas.arcxp.com/ideas/PB-I-311 into smaller ideas. This second idea follows from https://ideas.arcxp.com/ideas/PEN-I-110:
Provide a tool to convert JSON to PB Data (for both, whole PB configuration as well as PB Data of individual pages or templates).
Also, to allow uploading the whole PB Data configuration to the environment (mirrors the functionality provided currently by PB Data module, which only allows to download the configuration).
Currently only individual pages or templates can be exported or imported. For the whole PB configuration there is only the ability to download the data and restore locally.
With more then 100+ pages and templates we could use this feature to:
- backfill data from production to other environments without having to raise the ACS ticket
- export PB Data of an individual page or template, convert to JSON, edit, then upload to the same or a different environment
- make corrections to mulitple pages/templates/components at once then upload to the same or different environment (e.g. to download data from prod, update photo IDs, then upload to sandbox)
Grzegorz Junka
Hi Greg,
Thanks for the conversation to deep dive into the need for this idea in the past weeks. While the need you described is a valid and really valuable capability, I will mark this particular idea will not implement, just because of the way it describes json to pb-data conversion then import into an Arc environment is not feasible. But we're tracking the core capability internally. We're definitely interested in allowing our client developers to be able to search, filter, make bulk updates on page and feature configuration to make managing PageBuilder data at scale.
Hi Faith, thank you for following up. This is a miirror idea to the one asking to convert PB Data to JSON. I raised it as supposedly easier to implement than an API access to PB.
This idea is based on the fact that we can already export a page or template into a file then import it later. If the idea to convert PB Data to JSON was implemented, then it would be one more step to allow modifying the JSON data before importing it back.
It doesn't need to be an edit of the full PB Data. It would be enough to be able to export a single page or template, then convert to JSON, then update the JSON, the convert back to PB Data, then import as a new page or template, similarly to how we do now.
Exporting and importing the whole PB Datat would allow to backfill data from production to a QA environment and update the PB Data on the way, e.g. to update environment-specific IDs or apply back changes that are only in sandbox but not in prod.
Hi Greg,
I will check with the Editor team, but the first look at this idea has implications for PB Editor team and the integrity of an environment's pb-data. Especially production environment will probably never have a full-data import in any way. Although the use case/need I'm translating from this idea description is to be able to make bulk changes on the page configuration when making changes to feature/CS configurations (like renaming a custom field name) which is a valid need.
I will post an update once I check with the team, but I am pretty sure we'll say no to part: "import pb-data" to Arc environments, therefore we may file this idea won't implement, but maybe create another one in the realms of "allow me to make bulk updates on pages/templates for a feature or content source configuration". Essentially a "migration" task for developers. I'd like to do a follow-up chat with you about this to hear your team's use case.