Syncing QuickBooks invoices with multiple line items into Airtable

Questions
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1

:bullseye: What is your goal?

I want to automatically sync invoices from QuickBooks to Airtable with all line items from an invoice being properly captured in one field in Airtable.

:thinking: What is the problem & what have you tried?

I’m using the QuickBooks “Search Records” module to grab invoices and the Airtable “Create Record” module to send the data into my base. The issue is that invoices with multiple line items only send one line item to Airtable; Make doesn’t seem to process the full array of lines.
I tried adding an Iterator to loop through the line items, but it didn’t work as expected (only one item still appeared). I’m not sure whether the iterator should go before or after the QuickBooks module, or whether I need an array aggregator or repeater. Any tips on how to properly map multiple QuickBooks line items into Airtable?

3

@Samir_AlBayeh You’ll only need to aggregate (text aggregator) those bundles from the Iterator into one text block, then you can proceed with adding them into Airtable. Let me know how it goes!

4

Welcome to the Make community!

Combining Bundles Using Aggregators

Every result/item from some module types (like Trigger / Iterator / List / Search / Match modules) can potentially and likely output more than one bundle. These multiple bundles will individually run subsequent modules once per bundle, which is not optimal in most cases:

  • one operation per bundle per module, which could lead to…
  • use of multiple credits per bundle per module (some modules use more than one credit)
View example screenshots

Aggregator Example

The “Search Rows” module runs one time, returning 999 results (999 bundles).

  • Without Aggregator: the tools module run 999 times (999 operations)

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    (and if there are more modules, they run 999 times each)

  • With Aggregator: the tools module only runs 1 time (1 operation)

    905Ă—337 33.7 KB

:warning: Warning: :police_car_light:
This can easily use your entire quota of credits if you are not careful or fail to understand this concept.

To “combine” multiple bundles into a single variable, so that you can process all of the items in a single operation, you’ll need to use an aggregator. Aggregators is a type of module that accumulates bundles and outputs one bundle (unless you are using “Group By”). An example of a commonly-used aggregator module is the Array aggregator module.

You can find out more about some other aggregator modules here:

Question: Which is the best aggregator do you think you’ll need for your use-case?

Mapping a Complex (Collection) Structure Into an Array Field

The Array Aggregator module is very powerful because it allows you to build a new complex array of collections that matches a later module’s array field to map multiple items (collections) to it. Such fields initially may allow you to manually add individual items, but toggle the “Map” switch on, and you can map an array variable (from an Array Aggregator) containing multiple collections.

Simply select the respective “Target structure type” in an Array Aggregator module.

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As you can see from the above example, the “Map” toggle on complex fields are used when you have an array variable (like from an array aggregator).

:clipboard: Note: :light_bulb:
Other combinations of modules may also allow you to generate an array that matches a future module field’s array structure, like “Aggregate to JSON + Parse JSON”, or “Create JSON + Parse JSON”, but this is an advanced topic.

Question: Are you mapping your array into a field that accepts more than one item/collection?

Example

Here is an example of how your scenario could look like:

This is just an example. Your solution may or may not look like this depending on requirements and actual data.

For more information, see “Mapping with arrays” in the Help Centre. You should also do the Make Academy, which also covers the use of Iterators & Aggregators.

Hope this helps! If you are still having trouble, please provide more details.

— @samliew
P.S.: investing some effort into the tutorials in the Make Academy will save you lots of time and frustration using Make!