trouble importing csv file to create email list
I have a list in an Excel file of about 100 email addresses. I want to send an email to all of them. I followed the instructions to open Address Book, Tools/Import, selected Address Books, found the .csv file, hit Open. In the Import Address Book box it shows the first email on the list. I then clicked OK but when I opened the address book, it was blank. I tried again, this time in the Import Address Book box I clicked Next repeatedly and each name showed up, but I got the same result - a blank address book.
My csv file is just one column with the emails, not the names.
When I select the csv file, should I select Comma Separated? Should I go back to the Excel file and put commas after each address?
Help! Thank you!
Όλες οι απαντήσεις (3)
Hi Comma separated should work. Set that option when you export from Excel, you do not have to type the commas. One useful tip is to export to csv from Thunderbird, to get an example csv file. Then make sure your csv has the same headers on the columns you want to import, and create a csv file that looks the same as the example you exported from Thunderbird. Agnes
Thanks for this -- however last night I was playing around with it some more and came up with a different solution, which doesn't really make sense but it worked: I copied the column of emails from the Excel file and pasted into the BCC of a new Thunderbird email. Everything ran together, with 2 commas in between each email. I thought maybe I could go through and delete all the commas, but that wasn't necessary. I deleted the commas after just the first email name, and hit return. And all the rest of the names were instantly correctly formatted. So while it didn't create an address book, which would have been nice if I have to mail to them again, copying and pasting was pretty easy and painless.
The issue is excel is still using ansi text (think 20th Century really, windows XP used unicode) and Thunderbird is using unicode. Use another spreadsheet like libre office and all is well, or open the file in notepad after Excel has "imported" and "exported" it and use file save as to save it again and check the unicode option in the save as dialog.
Note the first line needs to contain a heading like EMail so you can manipulate the import to set the correct import field to the correct address book field.