T-Synch ExcelExport

Content Type: Module
Categories: Import/Export

Overview

This module provides an extension to the module ‘Excel Exporter Template Manager’ in order to simplify the regular activity of importing Excel export templates. Using this capability, you do not need to worry about the most recent template versions being imported into the application.

Documentation

Description

This module provides an extension to the module ‘Excel Exporter Template Manager’ in order to simplify the regular activity of importing Excel export templates. Using this capability, you do not need to worry about the most recent template versions being imported into the application.

Typical usage scenario

Your application integrates the Excel export capability and you are developing a couple of different templates which are continuously evolving. Therefore you have to manage these new/updated templates which could sometimes require quite a lot of time and may result in mistakes. Just think about the different environments with different versions!

This module helps you with keeping the set of templates synchronized in a consistent way in an environment. You only have to store the most recent template version in a specific directory, and T-Synch capability can manage the necessary changes (removing old version and importing new one) after you package and deploy the new application version and then the application starts up.

Features and limitations

Ensure to have all necessary Excel export template files imported automatically for each environment.

This module is limited to the Excel Exporter highest version up to v6.1.3 and v7.0.3, because the Excel Exporter Template Manager does not support v6.1.4/v7.0.3 or above.

Dependencies

This module is compatible with the Mendix v8.18.22.

Required external modules:

Installation

  1. Use the SNIP_ExcelExportTemplateOverview to create an overview page of the synchronization folder content and the current synchronized state. You can control a manual synchronization on this UI snippet.

  2. Use the SUB_SynchronizeExcelExportTemplates microflow in your after startup microflow call to be able to automatically run the synchronization on startup.

  3. Assign necessary application user role(s) to the module role. The users need access to this module that have to maintain excel export templates either in design time or in running (e.g. testing, operation) time.

  4. If you want to highlight the differences in the data grids on the UI, you can use scss like below to highlight the rows with the cellstyler widget.

.mx-datagrid { table { tbody tr { &.orangebg td { background-color: #fca582; } &.bluebg td { background-color: #82cffc; } &.greenbg td { background-color: #72c400; } } } }

 

Configuration

You can configure the T-Synch capabilities by means of the following environment constants:

  • ExcelExportTemplate_AutomaticsSyncOnStartUp:
    turn on/off automatic synchronization during the starting application. (default: FALSE)

  • ExcelExportTemplateDirectory:
    the place of Excel export template XML files relative to under the 'resource' directory. (default: "ExcelExportTemplates")

  • ExcelExportTemplateObjectModuleList:
    the list of modules to be refreshed to get all needed reflection objects. (default: "System, Administration")

Known bugs

  1. You modify the template already imported in the application and the module does not notice/indicate this change in synch. (The hash is created during synch and cannot be reproduced for already created template objects.)

  2. Duplicated template names are not recognized and managed.

Please use the ‘User reviews’ channel of this module at the Mendix Marketplace to report any issue you experience. Thanks!

Frequently Asked Questions

  • Q: Why are my original templates not removed?
    A: At first run (for each environment), you need to remove all the templates that you want to manage by this module. All such templates shall be imported via this module to have appropriate control above them. However this could result in duplication if you do not remove the original one.

  • Q: I saved a new template version to the specific directory, but it is not presented in the T-Synch overview. Why?
    A: The content of the investigated 'resource' directory is created in building time. Therefore all new exported template files need to rebuild the application. 

  • Q: I deleted a template file from the specific directory, but it is still presented in the T-Synch overview and is synchronized. Why?
    A:     The content of the investigated 'resource' directory is created in building time. Therefore having all file changes enforced requires rebuilding and then restarting the application. In addition, Mendix sometimes does not rebuild all files of the target package, even if some files are deleted from the original (source) resource directory. Only the new files are added. In this case, you need to use the 'Clean Deployment Directory' function of Mendix Studio Pro to have a clear package composed of the files that are actually needed.

Releases

Version: 1.0.0
Framework Version: 8.18.22
Release Notes: This is the first release.