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User Guide
Version 2020.1
Last Revision:2021-01-04
Objectif Lune, Inc.
2030 Pie-IX, Suite 500
Montréal, QC, Canada, H1V 2C8
+1 (514) 875-5863
www.objectiflune.com
All trademarks displayed are the property of their respective owners.
© Objectif Lune, Inc. 1994-2021. All rights reserved. No part of this documentation may be
reproduced, transmitted or distributed outside of Objectif Lune Inc. by any means whatsoever
without the express written permission of Objectif Lune Inc. Inc. Objectif Lune Inc. Inc. disclaims
responsibility for any errors and omissions in this documentation and accepts no responsibility
for damages arising from such inconsistencies or their further consequences of any kind.
Objectif Lune Inc. Inc reserves the right to alter the information contained in this documentation
without notice.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents 4
Welcome to PlanetPress Workflow 2020.1 13
Notes in this guide 13
Installation and setup 15
System requirements 15
Operating System 15
Virtual environments 15
Minimum hardware requirements 16
Recommended hardware requirements 17
Requirements for individual Connect modules 17
Environment considerations 18
Terminal Services 18
Virtual environments 18
32-bit or 64-bit? 19
Antivirus considerations 19
Backup software 20
Microsoft Office compatibility 21
Setting up the working environment 21
Network considerations 21
Local and network rights 21
Account requirements 22
Mapped drives 22
Network ports used by each service 22
Known Issues 24
File Count input task ignores polling interval 24
HTTP Server Input triggers all trigger-based processes 25
Microsoft patch causing handling of XLS to fail 25
Data Repository error 26
Other known issues 26
Basics 30
Related tools and resource files 30
Features 32
About Workflow Configurations 32
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Creating a new configuration 33
Open a PlanetPress Workflow configuration file 34
Saving and sending a Workflow Configuration 35
Exit PlanetPress Workflow Configuration program 37
Workflow Configuration resource files 38
Connect resources 38
PlanetPress Design documents 42
PrintShop Mail documents 48
About data 48
About documents and variable data 49
Job file 50
Job file names and output file names 50
Data selections 52
About data emulation 58
Sample Data 69
Metadata 73
Working with JSON 89
Data Repository 93
Structure 94
Accessing the Data Repository 94
Where to find the Data Repository 96
Debugging and error handling 96
About error handling 96
Using the On Error tab 97
Creating and using Error processes 98
Accessing the Logs 100
Resubmit backed up input files to a process 102
Debugging your PlanetPress Workflow process 104
About printing 108
OL Connect print jobs 108
PlanetPress Suite print jobs 109
PlanetPress Workflow printer queues 110
Shared printer queue properties 111
Windows Output printer queue 113
LPR Output Printer Queue 114
FTP Output Printer Queue 116
Send to Folder printer queue 117
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Load balancing 118
Associating PlanetPress Design documents and PlanetPress printer queues 119
Triggers 120
Objectif Lune Printer Driver (PS) 121
About processes and subprocesses 124
Processes 124
Startup processes 125
Subprocesses 125
Creating a process 126
Importing processes 128
Activating or deactivating a process 129
Process properties 130
About branches and conditions 136
Converting a branch to a subprocess 138
Running a process on desktop 138
Using Scripts 141
Run Script task 141
APIs 142
The Script Editor and XSLT Editor 143
SOAP Server API Reference 149
The Watch Object 156
Data Repository API 174
Metadata API 196
Attributes 216
Count 216
Fields 216
Index 216
NodeType 217
Parent 217
Selected 217
SelectedCount 218
SelectedState 218
Add(Integer Index) 219
AttributeByIndex(Integer Index) 219
AttributeByName(const String Name) 220
Clear() 220
Copy() 220
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Cut() 220
DatapageCount() 221
Delete() 221
DocumentCount() 221
FieldByIndex(Integer Index) 222
FieldByName(const String Name) 222
FieldByNameIndex(const String Name, Integer Index) 223
IndexInDocument() 223
IndexInGroup() 223
IndexInJob() 224
Item(Integer Index) 224
PageCount() 225
Paste() 225
PasteAt(Integer Index) 225
Select(TSelectWhat SelectWhat) 226
SelectedDatapageCount() 226
SelectedDocumentCount() 227
SelectedIndexInDocument() 227
SelectedIndexInGroup() 227
SelectedIndexInJob() 228
SelectedPageCount() 228
Sort(const String Name, optional TSortFlags Flags, optional const String Name2,
optional TSortFlags Flags2, optional const String Name3, optional TSortFlags Flags3)
228
Parameters 233
Exceptions 234
Parameters 234
Exceptions 235
Parameters 235
Returns 235
Parameters 235
Exceptions 236
Parameters 236
Returns 236
Exceptions 236
Parameters 236
Returns 236
Parameters 237
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Returns 237
Exceptions 237
Parameters 237
Returns 237
Exceptions 238
AlambicEdit API reference 241
Stopping execution 274
Special workflow types 276
HTTP Server workflow 277
PDF Workflow 285
PlanetPress Capture Workflow 287
Workflow processes in a Connect Send solution 296
About Tasks 298
Adding tasks 299
Editing a task 300
Task properties 300
Masks 304
Selecting a resource file in task properties 305
Input tasks 307
Action tasks 375
Data splitters 447
Process logic tasks 467
Connector tasks 486
PlanetPress Capture 533
Metadata tasks 555
OL Connect Send 572
OL Connect tasks 586
Output tasks 639
Document Management tasks 665
Connection tab 667
Download tab 668
Connection tab 672
Upload tab 674
Advanced properties 680
Advanced properties 683
Email Services 689
Unknown tasks 696
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About variables 696
Job Info variables 697
System variables 699
Local variables 704
Global variables 705
Variable task properties 707
Workflow add-ons 710
PlanetPress Capture 710
Capture OnTheGo (COTG) 738
About PlanetPress Fax 738
About PlanetPress Image 739
OL Connect Send 740
ZUGFeRD 741
About related programs and services 742
Available Input services 743
Available Output services 743
Start and stop PlanetPress Workflow Service 744
Users and configurations 745
Workflow Services 746
Preferences 749
Other preferences and settings 750
General appearance preferences 750
Object Inspector appearance preferences 751
Configuration Components pane appearance preferences 752
Colors 752
Options 752
Default configuration behavior preferences 753
Notification Messages behavior preferences 754
Preferences 754
Sample Data behavior preferences 757
Preferences 757
Network behavior preferences 757
Preferences 757
PlanetPress Capture preferences 758
PlanetPress Capture Server/Client 759
PlanetPress Document Manager 760
PlanetPress Capture ODBC Settings 762
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PlanetPress Capture Pen Management Tool 764
PlanetPress Capture License Management 766
OL Connect preferences 767
PDF text extraction tolerance factors 768
General and logging preferences 770
Messenger plugin preferences 771
Preferences 772
HTTP Server Input plugin preferences 1 772
Preferences 773
HTTP Server Input plugin preferences 2 777
LPD Input plugin preferences 778
Preferences 779
NodeJS Server Input plugin preferences 1 779
NodeJS Server Input plugin preferences 2 781
NodeJS Server Input plugin preferences 3 782
Testing the server 783
Changing the Log in page 783
Setting the duration of the authentication 784
Serial Input plugin preferences 784
Preferences 784
Telnet Input plugin preferences 785
Preferences 785
PlanetPress Fax plugin preferences 786
Preferences 786
Captaris RightFax options 788
FTP Output Service preferences 789
Options 789
PlanetPress Image preferences 790
LPR Output preferences 793
Options 793
PrintShop Web Connect Service preferences 795
Editor Options 795
The user interface 800
Customizing the Workspace 801
Dock and undock areas of the Program Window 801
Show or hide areas of the program window 803
Combine and attach areas 803
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Resize the program window areas 808
Change the Interface language 809
PlanetPress Workflow Button 810
Options 810
Configuration Components pane 811
Components Area Sections 811
PlanetPress Design document properties 814
Moving and copying configuration components 817
Renaming objects in the Configuration Components Pane 820
Reordering objects in the Configuration Components pane 820
Grouping Configuration Components 821
Expanding and collapsing categories and groups in the Configuration Components
pane
823
Deleting something from the Configuration Components pane 823
Dialogs 824
Access Manager 824
Activate a printer 830
Advanced SQL Statement Dialog 831
Data Repository Manager 832
The Data Selector 835
The File Viewer 839
Data Selector display preferences 840
PDF Viewer 842
Printer utilities 844
Process properties 847
Rule Interface 853
Task Properties dialog 856
Update document 857
Virtual Drive Manager 858
The Debug Information pane 858
The Message Area Pane 859
The Object Inspector pane 860
Editing properties 861
The Plug-in Bar 861
Categories 862
Settings and customization 863
The Process area 864
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Cutting, copying and pasting tasks and branches 865
Highlight a task or branch 866
Disabling tasks and branches 867
Moving a task or branch using drag-and-drop 868
Redo a command 869
Removing tasks or branches 869
Replacing tasks, conditions or branches 870
Resize the rows and columns of the Process area 870
Collapse and expand branches and conditions 871
Undo a command 871
Zoom in or out within the Process Area 872
The Quick Access Toolbar 872
Adding buttons 872
Removing buttons 872
Moving the toolbar 873
The PlanetPress Workflow Ribbon 873
The Task Comments Pane 876
The PlanetPress Workflow Service Console 876
Controlling Services 877
Viewing log files 878
Knowledge Base 880
Legal Notices and Acknowledgments 881
Copyright Information 887
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Welcome to PlanetPress Workflow
2020.1
This PDF documentation covers version 2020.1. To view the documentation of previous
versions please refer to the PDF files available in the Downloads section of our website:
http://www.objectiflune.com/OL/Download/DownloadCenter.
Workflow is the heart of all of our solutions. Working in conjunction with PlanetPress Connect,
PlanetPress Capture, CaptureOnTheGO, PlanetPress Imaging, PlanetPress Fax, and a variety
of plugins, it helps improve your communications processes. Processes such as
communication creation, interaction, distribution and even maintenance.
Workflow is the "super dispatcher". It caters for inputs from a huge variety of sources, such as
email, web pages, databases, individual files (PDF, csv, XML, etc), print streams, FTP, Telnet
and ERP systems. This data can then be analyzed, modified, stored, verified, routed and used
as triggers for other processes from entirely within Workflow. Finally it is passed to one of our
other products (or not) to be outputted in multiple ways (printed, emailed, posted, archived, sent
to third party solutions, etc..).
Consider Workflow as a set of buildings blocks that enable you to build your own customized
automated processes which will fit your environment and not the other way around. Create
processes that will save you time and money!
Notes in this guide
Notes are used throughout this guide to draw your attention to certain information.
Note
Important information that deserves your attention.
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Tip
Information that may help you use PlanetPress Workflow better or that suggests an easier
method.
Warning
Information that is potentially critical to using PlanetPress Workflow.
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Installation and setup
The installation procedure for Workflow is described in the topic Installing Workflow.
The following topics describe the different considerations that are important in regards to the
installation and use of PlanetPress Workflow.
l "System requirements" below
l "Environment considerations" on page18
l "Setting up the working environment" on page21
l "Known Issues" on page24
System requirements
These are the recommended system requirements for PlanetPress Workflow 2020.1.
Operating System
l Microsoft Windows 2008 R2 Server
l Microsoft Windows 2012/2012 R2 Server
l Microsoft Windows 2016 Server
l Microsoft Windows 2019 Server
l Windows 7
l Microsoft Windows 8.1
l Microsoft Windows 10 (Pro and Enterprise versions only)
Note
Windows Vista, Windows 8.0, Windows 2003 Server and earlier versions of Windows are
not supported by PlanetPress Workflow.
Virtual environments
PlanetPress Workflow supports the following virtual environments:
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l VMWare Environments. This includes VMWare Player, VMWare Workstation as well as
VMWare ESX Server.
l VMWare VMotion. This means the virtual machine hosting PlanetPress Workflow can be
automatically moved from one ESX server to another in a clustered installation.
l Microsoft Hyper-V/Azure infrastructure environments.
l Amazon Web Services (AWS)
PlanetPress Workflow is not officially supported on any other virtual machines such as Virtual
PC, Parallels, Bochs, Xen, etc. While running PlanetPress Workflow on these virtual machines
may work finewe have not tested them and cannot offer support for them.
Warning
The PlanetPress Workflow End-User License Agreement (EULA) specifies that a
PlanetPress Workflow software license may only be used on a single virtual or physical
PC at a time. While copying a virtual machine for backup purposes is acceptable, running
two instances of the same machine, using the same serial number, is strictly prohibited.
Minimum hardware requirements
As with any software application, minimum hardware requirements represent the basic
hardware on which the software will run. Note however that settling for the minimum
specification is unlikely to produce the performance you expect from the system. It can be used
when configuring a trial or a development system, however.
l File system: NTFS (FAT32 is not supported)
l CPU:multi-core
l RAM: 6GB
l Disk Space:At least 10GB*1
*1: Requirements will depend upon the amount of data you process through PlanetPress
Workflow. For instance, a PostScript file containing several thousands of documents could
easily take up several GBs.
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Recommended hardware requirements
Due to its versatility, OL Connect is used for a wide variety of applications. Consequently, it is
difficult to determine which hardware configuration will produce the best results for any given
implementation. The following specs should therefore be viewed as a general guideline that is
most likely to produce expected results for most implementations. You should, however, keep
in mind that it may not represent the optimal setup for your particular application.
l File system: NTFS (FAT32 is not supported)
l CPU:Intel Core i7-4770 Haswell or equivalent
l RAM: 16GB
l Disk Space: 20GB*
l Storage Type: Solid State Drive (SSD)
l Networking: 10Gb Ethernet
*: Requirements will depend upon the amount of data you process through PlanetPress
Workflow. For instance, a PostScript file containing several thousands of documents could
easily take up several GBs.
Requirements for individual Connect modules
OL Connect Products comprises multiple modules that can be operated separately on multiple
PCs. Each module has its own set of requirements that may differ from the other modules.
While the hardware requirements described above are relatively generic when installing all
Connect modules on a single server, they should not be interpreted literally for each individual
module.
When installing on multiple PCs, keep the following rules of thumb in mind:
l The Connect Workflow module requires less RAM but fast hard drive access. It also
benefits from fast multi-core CPUs, in order to run processes in parallel.
l The Connect Server module requires more RAM and benefits from fast multi-core CPUs.
Disk access speed is less of a concern.
l The Connect Designer module requires more RAM and fast disk access to provide a
responsive user-experience.
l The back-end database (MySQL by default) benefits from more RAM, speedy disk access
and fast networking as it will be solicited by all modules simultaneously.
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Environment considerations
This page provides technical information about the environment in which PlanetPress
Workflow is intended to run.
Terminal Services
PlanetPress Workflow does not support Terminal Services environment as possible under
Windows 2000, 2003 and 2008. This is to say, if Terminal Services is installed on the server
where PlanetPress Workflow is located, unexpected behaviors may occur and will not be
supported by our company. Furthermore, using PlanetPress Workflow in a Terminal Service
environment is probably an infringement of our End-User License Agreement.
Terminal Services may also be referred to as Terminal Server or Remote Administration Mode
(Windows Server 2003 and 2008).
Single-User Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) (where only one person can use RDP at a time)
is supported for PlanetPress Workflow version 6.2 and higher, however it is only supported in
Windows XP or Windows 2003. While later versions of Windows may not cause issues when
accessing PlanetPress Workflow through RDP, these combinations are no longer tested and
may not be functional.
Virtual environments
PlanetPress Workflow supports the following virtual environments:
l VMWare Environments. This includes VMWare Player, VMWare Workstation as well as
VMWare ESX Server.
l VMWare VMotion. This means the virtual machine hosting PlanetPress Workflow can be
automatically moved from one ESX server to another in a clustered installation.
l Microsoft Hyper-V/Azure infrastructure environments.
l Amazon Web Services (AWS)
PlanetPress Workflow is not officially supported on any other virtual machines such as Virtual
PC, Parallels, Bochs, Xen, etc. While running PlanetPress Workflow on these virtual machines
may work finewe have not tested them and cannot offer support for them.
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Warning
The PlanetPress Workflow End-User License Agreement (EULA) specifies that a
PlanetPress Workflow software license may only be used on a single virtual or physical
PC at a time. While copying a virtual machine for backup purposes is acceptable, running
two instances of the same machine, using the same serial number, is strictly prohibited.
32-bit or 64-bit?
PlanetPress Suite version 7.1.3 and higher, as well as PlanetPress Connect, support a 64-bit
operating system. However, PlanetPress Workflow remains 32-bits in this environment, which
means that for all intents and purposes there is no difference between those two environments
as far as PlanetPress Workflow is concerned.
Antivirus considerations
PlanetPress Workflow generates a very large amount of temporary data on your hard disk,
especially when manipulating or creating PDF files. This can sometimes cause issues when
any other software is trying to access the temporary files at the same time as PlanetPress
Workflow and its components are trying to read, write, create or delete those files.
If you experience these issues you may want to temporarily disable your antivirus "live", "daily"
or "deep" scans for the following folders and processes:
Warning
Disabling any antivirus scanning permanently on any folder or program is not
recommended, and Objectif Lune cannot be held reliable for any consequence of
disabling your antivirus or whitelisting the folders or executables listed here, or any other
change in your antivirus protection setup!
l On Windows 7/2008:
l C:\ProgramData\Objectif Lune\PlanetPress Workflow 8\
l C:\Users\[user]\AppData\Local\Temp\ (where [user] is the user under which
Workflow is configured)
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l C:\Users\[user]\Connect (where [user] is the user under which Workflow is
configured)
l On all systems:
l C:\Windows\Temp\
Note
C:\Windows\Temp\ is used by multiple software which may cause risks on
your computer. However, PlanetPress Workflow may use this folder as
temporary storage, especially in the case of creating PDF files. We do not
recommend disabling scan on this folder, unless you notice performance
issues when generating PDFs, and then only as a test.
l Processes:
l FTPPutService.exe
l HTTPService.exe
l LPDService.exe
l LPRService.exe
l PPWatchService.exe
l PSWService.exe
l SerialService.exe
l SMTPService.exe
l TelnetService.exe
l ppNode.exe
l PPFaxService.exe
l PPImageService.exe
l MessengerService.exe
Backup software
For similar reasons, it is important to know that backup software can also access files while
copying them to a remote backup location, so you should make sure that no PlanetPress
Workflow process is working during your backups.
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