Assemble Job with no delay

[cwswitch]

Hi,

I have a flow that is really a glorified hotfolder to the end user. They drag in a bunch of PDFs and the flow merges and processes them. There is then no XML, just PDFs flowing through.

I have to use the Assemble Job tool and it demands some kind of scheme. The best option I've found so far is to have the scheme After N minutes = 1, but I do not truly want any delay whatsoever.

I note that I cannot set this value to zero.

How can I please have this Assemble Job tool but not have to wait for an output. Note that there is nothing in the filenames or anything else I can think of to use as a filter, it really is just "whatever the user drops in.. deal with now".

[sander]

I once came up with this for the same situation, in my beginning Switch days tho

You throw in a file or folder, in case of a folder it's ungrouped and after it's assembled with that same ungrouped privatekey, which results in no unnecessary waiting.

[cwswitch]

Firstly thanks!

but...

Code: Select all

MergeTool error: Job is not a folder

Does not work - Uses Ungroup and Assemble based on private data ungroup..


http://imgur.com/a/dNhyl

Works, but has a delay of 1 minute - it uses "After N minutes = 1"


http://imgur.com/a/GJLPT

[TheCaptain]

I feel like I'm missing some minute of your Flow but could you set the Assemble to :

Screen Shot 2017-06-22 at 10.19.41.png (52.05 KiB) Viewed 26408 times

Or whatever the Private data key is. Where are you having to set the time to 1?

This feels like an error in your setup for assembly or merge.

[sander]

How do you submit the pdf's? You can't drop some of 'em in the root input folder, it needs to be in a folder else it doesn't know these belong to each other.

[cwswitch]

TheCaptain - yes, I tried the settings like that - assume issue may be as Sander raised that I'm dropping in PDFs.

Sander - yes, was really hoping to have the user drop PDF files in and have the flow merge whatever came along.

If I put the files in a folder and drop that in, I get the same error from the merge tool "job is not a folder"

[sander]

If a user can just drop files how do you know which files belong to a specific merge job then?

Hm, compare settings to my flow to find out!

https://we.tl/abUHAI2VdX

[cwswitch]

What I really want is for any files dropped in to be merged. It seems this is not best practice, but is what I need in this case.

If I use the 1 minute delay, this works. If I use the Ungroup method, it does not work. So I have a working solution, I just have to wait longer than I'd like.

I'm a little confused as to why the Merge tool requires input the way it does. I'm also unclear on why the Assemble Job tool can assemble just fine with a 1 minute delay, but not with no delay.

[sander]

Morning,

I was working on something else and, don't ask why, this topic popped up in my head.

How about such a thing? It's fast written code but should get you started.

It just reads the content of a directory and pushes all files to a folder which you can use with Merge PDF.

Just correctly set your timer interval and be sure to instruct the users who use it to not dump if the directory is not empty. It can be done each few seconds on my system but I bet that depends on your needs.

Hope it helps,

Code: Select all

// Is invoked at regular intervals regardless of whether a new job arrived or not.
// The interval can be modified with s.setTimerInterval().
function timerFired( s : Switch )
{
	var timer = s.getPropertyValue("Timer");
	var interval = parseInt(timer);	
	s.setTimerInterval(60);
		
		var sourceDir = new Dir("d:\\zooi\\dir");
		var files	= sourceDir.entryList("*", sourceDir.Files, sourceDir.Name);
		var folderPath = s.createPathWithName("pdf", true);
		var job = s.createNewJob();
		
         for (var i=0; i<files.length; i++) {
			 s.log(3, "d:\\zooi\\dir"+files[i]);
			 s.copy("d:\\zooi\\dir\\"+files[i], folderPath+'\\'+files[i]);

			}
		job.sendToSingle(folderPath, "mergeMe"); // Succes » out
}