Deployables are used when files must be distributed along with a task to many different machines. Task distribution supporting deployables can either be accomplished through manual exporting / importing of tasks, or task deployment through an AutoMate™ Enterprise Server
Deployables are used in actions that take a file path as a parameter (such as Start an Application, Open a document, Copy a File, Print a Document, etc.) by specifying the name of the deployable surrounded by double pipe symbols (i.e. ||DEPLOYABLENAME||). All steps that support deployables have a checkbox labeled Make this a deployable. This may be used where you may either create a new deployable by specifying a name that does not already exist or select one that does from the Name dropdown combo box.
Deployables allow tasks to be easily shared even if files that the task depends on such as basic scripts (.BAS), mouse recordings (.DAT) or executable (.EXE) files do not exist already on the users machine. By specifying a file as deployable, when the task is either exported or sent via the deploy feature through AutoMate™ Enterprise Server, AutoMate™ will automatically retrieve the file from the path specified in the Local Path parameter of the deployable. The file is then encoded into the STFF (Single task file format) when the task is exported or deployed. On task import or retrieval from an AutoMate™ Enterprise Server, all deployables are extracted to the path specified in the Remote Path parameter on the remote machine before the task executes. Any directories and subdirectories that do not exist are automatically created. Constants may be used in either the local path or the system path to deal with drive or directory ambiguities from system to system. After the files are extracted onto the remote machine, the value in the Local Path is overwritten with the value in the Remote Path and the task is imported. The steps that rely on the deployables continue to use the deployables to indicate the file so the task may be exported again from that machine if needed.
When AutoMate™ executes a task and a deployable is encountered (indicated by the double pipe symbols in the file path such as, ||DEPLOYABLENAME||), a lookup is performed in the tasks deployable list for the name specified between the || symbols. When found AutoMate™ looks at the Local Path value to determine which file to use for that action. All of this work occurs transparently to the user. After task execution the path still remains the deployable name so that the task retains its portability.
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