Exporting Data

ChatbotLab provides multiple ways to export conversation and participant data for analysis.

Admin Exports

From the Conversations, Utterances, or Bots admin list, filter or search down to the rows you want, then use the Export button to download them as:

• CSV: Tabular data suitable for R, Python, or Excel

• JSON: Structured data for downstream scripts

Every field on the model is included automatically — there’s no separate list of exportable columns to maintain per table.

Beyond the admin UI, you can always write a script against the Django ORM (see the example below) for exports that don’t fit a simple filtered list — joining across tables, custom formatting, or scheduled/automated runs.

Direct Database Exports

Developers can also export data directly from the MySQL database. Use:

mysqldump -u <user> -p chatlab_db > chatlab_data.sql

Example Script

from chatbot.models import Conversation, Utterance
import csv

with open("conversations.csv", "w") as f:
    writer = csv.writer(f)
    writer.writerow(["conversation_id", "participant_id", "started_time"])
    for convo in Conversation.objects.all():
        writer.writerow([convo.conversation_id, convo.participant_id, convo.started_time])

Privacy and Ethics

Always anonymize participant identifiers and remove sensitive metadata before sharing data. Align exports with your IRB’s data management plan.