The FileWriter component writes the received data from its input port to the specified output file. The received data can either be plain text or binary data.

File Writer is capable of handling:

• Text files
  Text content from input message is written to the configured file in text format.

• BinaryFiles
  Binary content from the input message is written to the configured file in binary format. 
  
  

Points to note

• The component runs on the Peer Server and therefore the file paths and directories mentioned in the CPS should be valid on the machine where the Peer Server is running. If the component fails over to another peer, ensure that the machine on which the secondary Peer Server is running does have the same path available.
• The received XML equivalent of the unstructured plain text needs to be transformed to its original format using the XML -> Flat component.
• FileWriter closes the file and moves it to the target directory on receiving a message having property COMPLETE whose value is set to true. This is useful even when you use Append if Exists output mode for the FileWriter component and you would like to close the file on the occurrence of this event.
• The FileWriter component uses the JMS Header filename to get the file name from the input message.

Configuration and Testing

Interaction Configurations

Business logic configuration details are configured in the second panel, Interaction Configurations. Figure 1 illustrates the panel with Expert Properties view enabled.


Figure 1: Interaction Configurations.

Attributes

Is input Binary?

Specifies whether the input received on the input port is binary.

• If enabled, it writes the data as bytes into the target file.

• If disabled, it writes text to the specified target file in an unstructured fashion.

FileWriter Configuration

Is Configured for Different Machine?

Specifies whether the Peer Server on which the component is to be launched and Fiorano Studio are running on the same machine or on different machines. This helps the component to determine the type of dialog to be shown while providing the paths of Source Directory, Working Directory, and Error Directory. When both the Peer Servers and the Fiorano Studio is running on the same machine, the paths to the above specified directories can be chosen from a file dialog with the directory structure of the current machine as shown in Figure 2. Otherwise, a text editor will be shown where the paths of Source/Working/Error directories need to be typed in as shown in Figure 3.

• Enabled if the Peer Server on which the component is to be launched and the Fiorano Studio are running on different machines.

• Disabled if the Peer Server and Fiorano Studio are on the same machine.
  
  In disabled state, paths of directories can be chosen from the file dialog. When the property is enabled, the paths of directories should be manually specified in the Text Editor as shown in Figure 2 and Figure 3.
  
  
  Figure 2: Choosing directory path using File Dialog
  
  
  Figure 3: Specifying directory path using Text Editor

Compute Paths relative to Directory

The path of the directory relative to which the paths of Target Directory, Working Directory, and Error Directory are computed. By default, this points to the FIORANO_HOME directory. If the paths specified for Target/Working/Error Directories are not absolute, their paths are calculated relative to the directory specified here.

File name

The name of the file to which the input data has to be written is specified here. If the file with this name does not exist, a new file is created.

Target Directory

The path of the directory where the target file (with the data received on the input port) is created. An absolute path of the target directory or a path relative to the directory specified in Compute Paths relative to Directory can be specified here. While specifying a directory as the Target Directory, make sure that you have permissions to create/modify files present in this directory.
If Is configured for different machine? is disabled, clicking the ellipses button will open a file dialog, , where the directory can be chosen from the file system. Otherwise the file path is written in the text editor.

Working directory

The path of the directory which should hold the files during intermediate processing. Either an absolute path or a path relative to the directory specified in the Compute Paths relative to Directory can be provided.

If Is configured for different machine? is disabled, clicking the ellipses button will open a file dialog, as shown in Figure 2, where the directory can be chosen from the file system. Otherwise, a text editor pops up where the path of the directory needs to be typed in. Shown in Figure 3.

Error directory

Path of the directory which should hold the files for which the processing has not been successful.

Use file details from message headers

Specify if the file details are to be taken from the header of the input message.

• If enabled, the name of the target file would be the value of the header property FileName present on the input message and the target directory would be the value of the header property directory.

• If disabled, the value specified for the CPS property Filename is used.
   

Append timestamp?

Specifies whether a timestamp is to be appended to the name of the target file.

Timestamp format

Specify the format in which the timestamp is to be appended to the name of the target file. Figure 23 shows the descriptions for the symbols that could be used in the Timestamp format.

Figure 4: Symbols used in Timestamp format.

Example: If Test.txt is the filename to which the data is to be written, the target file created could be Test_02042008_183950765.txt when the default format (ddMMyyyy_HHmmssSSS) is used.

Append Counter?

• If enabled, it appends a counter to the name of each file processed by the FileWriter in addition to the timestamp. The name of the file would look like <filename><time stamp><counter>. Appending counter to file names ensures that no two files created can have same name.

• If disabled, no counter is appended to the target file processed by the component FileWriter.

Example: If Test.txt is the filename to which the data is to be written, the target file created could be Test_02042008_183950765_0.txt when AppendCounter? is enabled.

Output Mode

Specify the way in which the output is to be created with the received data. Figure 5 shows the output formatting modes.

Figure 5: Output Mode

New file for each message

This option tells the FileWriter to create a new file for each input message that has been processed. When this output mode is being used, timestamp and counter can be appended to the filename using the properties Appendtimestamp? and Appendcounter?. The Appendtimestamp? option will be visible only when this option is selected as the OutputMode.

Append and close on timeout

This output mode is used for appending the content of all messages received till timeout, to a single file. During this time interval, the file is present in Working directory. When the timeout occurs, the file is closed and is moved to Target directory. Selecting this option will show the property FileTimeout(min) which can be used to set the timeout. Another property 'FileTimeout' will be visible when this mode is chosen.

File Timeout (min)

The time for which the component has to wait before closing and moving the file from Working directory to the Target directory is specified using this property. This is visible only when 'Append and close on timeout' is selected as the OutputMode.

Timeout after last message

Messages will be appended until timeout between two successive messages meets the timeout specified in the File TimeOut property. 

Append and close on event

This output mode is used for appending the content of all received messages to a single file until CLOSE_EVENT occurs. When a message with the header property CLOSE_EVENT set to true is received, the content of this message is appended to the file, the file is closed and is moved from Working directory to Target directory.

Do not write to file but send to output

The received data is sent to the output port instead of writing into a file. Figure 6 and Figure 7 show the snapshots of the text and binary data sent to output port. 

Figure6: Text data received on output port.


Figure7: Binary data received on output port.

Append if exists

If the file to which the data is to be written already exists, data is appended to the content in the existing file. The file being processed will be moved to the Working directory and content received in the input message will be appended to the existing file until FileWriter receives a message with a property COMPLETE set to true. (JMS function setStringProperty() can be used to set the value of a JMS property on a message). 

File Encoding

The encoding to be used while writing the file. The following encodings can be used. Figure 8 shows all the encodings that can be used.

Figure 8: Different types of File Encoding

PostProcessing Command

Script or a Command that is to be executed after the file processing is finished. A command can be specified by simply typing it in the text area provided against this property. To provide a script file, the file dialog which is shown by clicking the ellipses button can be used.

By default, the component appends the absolute path of the target file to this script/command that is. the absolute path of the target file would be the first argument to this script/command. More arguments for this command could be specified using the property PostProcessing Arguments.

The final command formed by the FileWriter would be:

PostProcessing Arguments

Arguments that are passed to postprocessing script or command.

Sample Scenario

Copying all the files present in Error directory to a backup location after the file is processed.

Solution

A batch file copyerrors.bat with content copy C:\FileWriter\ErrorDir %2 is written and is placed in C:\. The path of this batch file is specified for the property PostProcessing Command. The backup location (C:\ProcessingFailures) is specified as the value for PostProcessing Arguments.

Let C:\FileWriter\TargetDir\test.txt be the target file. With this configuration, the command formed by FileReader would be C:\copyerrors.bat C:\FileWriter\TargetDir\test.txt C:\ProcessingFailures. The copy command executed finally would be copy C:\FileWriter\ErrorDir C:\ProcessingFailures which moves all the files in C:\FileWriter\ErrorDir to the backup location C:\ProcessingFailures.

Time interval for PostProcessing script

Maximum interval of time for Post Processing Script to get finished; the value being in milliseconds.

Return data on Output?

Determines if the data written to the file is to be sent onto the output port instead of sending out an XML message containing the details of the file to which the content has been written. Figure 6 and Figure 7 show sample views of the text and binary data sent on the output port. As shown in the figures, enabling this property will send the data in the output message. However, the file details can still be fetched from the message headers of the output message. Refer Table 1 for the description of header properties.

Header Properties

Table 1 shows the descriptions of header properties set by the component on the output message when binary/flat content is processed.

Table 1: Header Properties

Move file to working directory on start?

This property is visble only if Show Expert Properties is selected and Output Mode is chosen as one of the following Append and close on timeout, Append and close on event or Timeout after last message. If a file is existing in target directory, choosing this option would move the file to working directory and appends the incoming messages to the file.

Input and Output

Input

No schema is set on the input port. If any XML message has to be written into a file then the XML message is directly sent as input message.

Output

When a file is written successfully, FileWriter sends out the file information onto the output port. Figure 9 shows the schema of the output XML message. Table 2 shows the description of the schema elements.

Figure 9: Schema on the output port

Table 2: Description of Output schema elements

Testing the Interaction Configurations

Interaction configurations can be tested from the CPS by clicking the Test button. Figure 10 and Figure 11 shows the sample input and the corresponding output message respectively.

Figure 10: Sample input

Figure 11: Output generated for input shown in Figure 10.

Functional Demonstration

Scenario

Writing the input message into to a file and displaying the response contents.
Configure the FileWriter as shown below.

Figure 12: Sample Configuration of FileWriter

Use feeder and display component to send sample input and check the response.

Figure13:Demonstratingscenario1withsampleinputandoutput

Input Message

Output Message

Use Case Scenario

In a revenue control packet scenario if an error occurs while parsing the transaction data, error message is written to file.

Figure 14: Revenue Control Packet Scenario.

The Event Process demonstrating this scenario is bundled with the installer.

Documentation of the scenario and instructions to run the flow can be found in the Help tab of the flow present in eStudio.