Your large import seems stuck or slow

If your import has been running for a long time, this page explains what the progress screen shows and when to take action.

What to expect

An import writes all of its rows in one step. While it runs, the progress screen shows a moving bar and “Importing {N} rows. This page updates every few seconds.” — where {N} is the number of rows in your file. There’s no count of rows done so far and no time estimate, because the rows are saved together when the import finishes. An import that stops before it finishes saves none of its rows, so nothing is ever half-imported.

When the import finishes, the progress screen takes you to the summary screen.

How to fix it

“The bar keeps moving, but the import hasn’t finished.”

That’s expected while the import is running. You can leave the page and come back — the import keeps running. Reloading the page doesn’t restart or change the import; it only reads its latest status.

“The progress screen says ‘This import hasn’t finished after 15 minutes’.”

MapleGather shows this when an import has no outcome 15 minutes after it started. The full message is: “If it’s still running, it will finish on its own, and this page checks again every 15 seconds. If it has stopped, none of its rows were saved: Retry import starts it again.” In the import history on the Migration page, the row shows Importing · over 15 minutes.

Give it a little longer. A very large file can take more than 15 minutes, and if the import is still running it finishes on its own.
If it stays like this, select Retry import on the progress screen. (The button is shown only to admins who can commit imports — the imports:write permission.) A retry only restarts the import if it has stopped. If it’s still running, you’ll see “This import is still running. Wait for it to finish, then refresh the page.” and nothing changes.
If you see “We couldn’t restart this import. Refresh the page to see its latest status.”, refresh the page: the progress screen shows where the import is now.

Retrying is safe: the attempt that stopped saved nothing, and members are matched by email, so no one is imported twice.

“The import stopped after it was started 3 times.”

An import can be started 3 times in all — the first time plus two retries. If it still hasn’t finished and you select Retry import again, MapleGather stops it instead of restarting it, and the progress screen shows Import failed with: “This import was started 3 times and never finished, so it has been stopped and nothing was imported. Upload the file again to start a new import. If the file is very large, splitting it into smaller files lets each import finish sooner.”

Upload the file again from Migration > New import. If it’s a very large file, split it into smaller files and import them one at a time.

“The progress screen says ‘Import failed’.”

The message under Import failed names the cause and what to do next — see Commit and monitor an import for each message. Nothing from a failed import is saved.

“The progress screen says ‘Import queued.’”

(Not available yet: MapleGather doesn’t queue a second import behind a running one today — the import status has no “queued” value. This is planned with concurrent-import support (Story 14.1.5, M2, not built yet). Kept as written for that release.)

This is expected behavior when a second import is started while one is already running. Per-organization imports run serially: the second import waits until the first one finishes before starting. The screen shows an estimated start time when available.

You don’t need to do anything. When the first import completes, the queued import starts automatically.

“I want to cancel and start over.”

Cancelling isn’t available in this release. The progress screen shows a Cancel import button that can’t be selected, with the note “Cancel isn’t available in this release. An import that stops before it finishes saves none of its rows, and this page then offers Retry import.”

Let the import finish. Once it shows Completed, you can undo it from the import history within 48 hours, then import again. See Undo a committed import.

If that didn’t work

If Retry import isn’t shown, your role can’t commit imports (imports:write): ask an admin who can to retry it. If the import failed, the message under Import failed says why and what to do; for a file that keeps stopping before it finishes, split it into smaller files and import them one at a time.