Setting external attributes inside a workflow

I know that this could probably go into the workflow forum, but I thought it might be approriate her as well.....

I have an app that contains a workflow that generates the dcr by calling iwpt_compile and then it submits and deploys the resulting files. The dcrs have images associated with them and the path and file names of the images are captured on the dct and stored in the dcr. I want to set this image path and name as an external attribute of the dcr and use that attribute to attach the image file to the workflow and then deploy that image file along with the resulting xml file.

My workflow currently generates the xml file and I know I can run iwextattr in order to set to external attribute. My question is when is the best time within the workflow to call iwextattr - do I call it within the tpl as the dcr is being created, or do I have to call it outside of the tpl AFTER the dcr has been generated? Are there any examples of this type of operation that anyone is aware of?

Thanks for the input!

Craig

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nipper

I do that in the generateHTML script rather than part of the TPL.

Basically I have a large loop, setting an array (@generatedFiles) with the files to be generated (1st is the destination for iwpt_compile, the rest are optional ostream files)

run iwpt_compile
attach all files in @generatedFiles to WF
parse DCR for images and attach them, this assumes you use a consistent field name for the image (<image>)
set EAs via:

[html]
sub setDCREAs
{
my($file, $name1, $value1, $name2, $value2, $name3, $value3) = @_;

my $iwextattr = "$iwhome/bin/iwextattr";

my $EA_xml = qq(

$name1
$value1

$name2
$value2

$name3
$value3

);
if (open(PIPE, "|$iwextattr -s -x $file")){
print PIPE $EA_xml;
close(PIPE);
} else {
$Util->debug($debugFile, "EAs failed on $file ") ;
}
}
[/html]

frbcraig

Hi Nipper -

Thank you for your reply -

1) Is generateHTML an ipl file that is called as part of the workflow??

2) does:
"run iwpt_compile
attach all files in @generatedFiles to WF
parase DCR for images and attach them
set ea's"

represent one iteration through the loop?? SO @generateHTML is reinitialized each time through the loop?

Thank you again for your replies.....

Craig

nipper

Hi Nipper -

Thank you for your reply -

1) Is generateHTML an ipl file that is called as part of the workflow??

2) does:
"run iwpt_compile
attach all files in @generatedFiles to WF
parase DCR for images and attach them
set ea's"

represent one iteration through the loop?? SO @generateHTML is reinitialized each time through the loop?

Thank you again for your replies.....

Craig

Yep, otherwise you will keep adding the same file to a WF over and over again. Just a big waste of time.

frbcraig

Quick question - Inside my gneratefiles.ipl, which is a step in the workflow, I need to read/parse the DCR's (the files the user selected before hitting submit) attached to the workflow in order to get to the images value. What is the best way to read the dcr into an xml string that can then be manipulated via DCRNode? I am looking through all of the doc, but am hitting a deadend - can you give a simple example of this functionality?

Again - thank you so much for the pointers - this has been a real education!!

Thanks,

Craig

nipper

Quick question - Inside my gneratefiles.ipl, which is a step in the workflow, I need to read/parse the DCR's (the files the user selected before hitting submit) attached to the workflow in order to get to the images value. What is the best way to read the dcr into an xml string that can then be manipulated via DCRNode? I am looking through all of the doc, but am hitting a deadend - can you give a simple example of this functionality?

Again - thank you so much for the pointers - this has been a real education!!

Thanks,

Craig

Go to GearUp and you will get a lot more of this.

Write a function and put it as a PM on you system. You will need it a great deal. It will be something like this:

[html]
sub _getXML
{
my ($file) = @_;
open (XML, "$file") || die "Cannot open $file for reading:$!";
{
local $/ = undef;
$xml = ;
}
close(XML);
return $xml;
}
[/html]

That will return the XML to a variable (say $xml)

then you can use a regex like this:

[html]
my @images = ( $xml =~ m|(.*)|ig);
[/html]

That is if all of your image tags are named Image (there can be many within various levels of containers.

This would be faster than using DCRNode.

Adam Stoller

Go to GearUp and you will get a lot more of this.

Write a function and put it as a PM on you system. You will need it a great deal. It will be something like this:

[html]sub _getXML
{
my ($file) = @_;
open (XML, "$file") || die "Cannot open $file for reading:$!";
{
local $/ = undef;
$xml = ;
}
close(XML);
return $xml;
}[/html]

Although essentially the same code - a slightly better implementation is:[html]sub _getXML {
my $file = shift;
open(XML, '<', $file) || die " '$file' ($!)";
my $xml = do {local $/; };
close(XML);
return $xml;
}[/html]

That will return the XML to a variable (say $xml)

then you can use a regex like this:

[html]
my @images = ( $xml =~ m|(.*)|ig);
[/html]

That is if all of your image tags are named Image (there can be many within various levels of containers.

This would be faster than using DCRNode.

The above assumes that images are only referenced within an 'Image' element in the DCT and that it is all on one line - if you want to make sure everything is in one line, change the _getXML routine to remove all embedded newlines and carriage retruns[html]...
$xml =~ s|\r?\n||smg;
return $xml;
@}[/html]In order to capture image references within VFEs you would have to do something like:[html]my @imgs = ($xml =~ m|

]*src=['"]?([^'"\s>]+)['"\s]?[^>]*>|smig);[/html](warning: unverified code - based solely on the previously posted code)

If you have both separate image elements and images embedded within VFEs - then you need to do a combination of both of these pieces of code to collect all the image references.

nipper

OK the point about VFE I agree with, I typically don't allow users to add images via VFE, so I have never implemented that.

Typically browse elements don't have line feeds (or carriage returns) so I never have bothered with the regex you showed.

What is the difference on the reading of the XML file except I forgot to use a my xml declaration at the beginning of the module ?

ISCBorisB

What is the difference on the reading of the XML file except I forgot to use a my xml declaration at the beginning of the module ?

Counting the line you've missed, it's one line of code instead of 5.
Without the loss of clarity (which is sometimes my Perl sin) not bad if you ask me.