Manatee v1.28

A trigger is a mechanism by which an external event may cause a flow to be invoked.

When a flow is invoked with a trigger its Inputs will contain two extra pieces of information:

  • [eu.sirenia]Manatee.In.Trigger will contain the type of the trigger
  • [eu.sirenia]Manatee.In.TriggerParams will contain any parameters the trigger may provide (see below for examples)

# Adding a trigger to a flow

A trigger can be added to a flow in the Settings tab for a flow.

Adding a trigger

The trigger will activate on all Manatees on which it is possible to run the flow (controlled via the groups of the flow and the application that contains the flow).

# External triggers

External triggers are all triggers that are external to the Manatee but are still events on the local machine.

# Window

The window trigger can launch a flow based on whether a matching window is shown or hidden.

# Configurable parameters

  • Event which window-event to use (‘shown’ or ‘hidden’)
  • Title the title which the window must have
  • Class the class of the window frame
  • CloseWindow whether or not to immediately close the detected window

# Parameters to flow

The trigger type is WINDOW.

  • title the actual title of the detected window
  • hwnd the window handle
  • kind the kind of event (window ‘shown’ or ‘hidden’)
  • className the class of the window frame
  • closeWindow whether or not the window was closed

The parameters are serialized as a JSON object.

# File-system

The filesystem trigger can monitor a directory for files that are either added, removed or changed.

# Configurable parameters

  • Directory the directory to monitor
  • Match a regular expression which filters the files that will be used to trigger the flow

# Parameters to flow

The trigger type is FILESYSTEM.

  • file the acual file that caused the trigger to fire
  • eventType the type of event (‘CREATED’, ‘CHANGED’, ‘RENAMED’ or ‘DELETED’)

The parameters are serialized as a JSON object.

# Cron

The cron trigger can launch a flow on a certain time-schedule.

# Configurable parameters

The trigger is configured with a cron string (opens new window) which specifies a schedule with which to fire the flow. The UI in Cuesta tries to be helpful in explaining when a trigger will fire as you type in the components of the cron string.

# Parameters to flow

The trigger type is CRON.

  • cronString the cron string which triggered the flow

The parameters are serialized as a JSON object.

# Hotkey

The hotkey trigger can launch a flow when the user hits a matching keyboard combo.

A valid combo must include at least one modifier key and one other key, e.g. ctrl+r is valid, while r is not.

# Configurable parameters

  • modifierKeys a set of modifier keys the user must press
  • keys a set of keys the user must press while the modifier keys are pressed

# Parameters to flow

The trigger type is HOTKEY.

  • modifierKeys the set of modifier keys the user pressed
  • keys the set of keys the user pressed

# Keyboard

The keyboard trigger listens for fast keyboard input matching a given regular expression. The match-value of the first group in the regex is given as input to the flow. If you have any subgroups in your trigger regular expression then you need to wrap the whole regular expression in paranthesis to form the first group. E.g. you’re using this trigger for keyboard wedge configured barcode scanners and your raw input is something like: {OEM1}d01029284{NUMPAD0}{NUMPAD8}21982798{NUMPAD0}. In order to be resistant to keyboard layout changes you can then construct a regular expression:

.*d\d{8}(\{[^\}].+\})+\d{8}(\{[^\}].+\})+

But since the first group will match the {NUMPADN} elements, then that is the input given to the flow. This can then be fixed by adding an initial group:

.*d(\d{8}(\{[^\}].+\})+\d{8}(\{[^\}].+\})+)

This trigger is most useful with devices such as scanners that can be configured to act as keyboards. The trigger will hold the input characters in a buffer for a short (while) and trigger a flow if the input buffer contains a matching sequence of characters. The input itself is not blocked and will end where the window focus is.

# Configurable parameters

  • match the regular expression which the input buffer must match
  • lookbackMs the number of milliseconds the input buffer will contain the characters

# Parameters to flow

The trigger type is KEYBOARD.

  • match the value of the matching string, either the first group in the regular expression or the complete match if it does not contain any groups

# Table

The table trigger is used to fire flows when a table is modified.

# Configurable parameters

  • table which table to look for changes to

# Parameters to flow

The trigger type is TABLE.

  • tableId the id of the changed table
  • tableName its name

# Event intercept triggers

The event intercept trigger can launch a flow when the user clicks a given field.

# Configurable parameters

  • eventType is the type of the intercept (LEFTCLICK or RIGHTCLICK)
  • fieldId is the identifier of the field to intercept events on

# Parameters to flow

The trigger type is INTERCEPT.

  • eventType is the type of the intercept (LEFTCLICK or RIGHTCLICK)
  • fieldId is the identifier of the field to intercept events on
  • fieldName is the name of the field clicked
  • fieldPath is the configured path of the element clicked

# Context triggers

The trigger type is CONTEXT.

Context triggers are triggers which will fire a flow once the shared context matches the preconditions for the trigger.

# Context change

Run a flow whenever a subject in the shared context changes a value matching the configured properties of the trigger.

# Configurable parameters

  • subject the subject to match
  • oldValue the old value to match (regular expression, default is empty which matches all values)
  • newValue the new value to match (regular expression, default is empty which matches all values)

# Parameters to flow

The trigger type is CONTEXT.

  • subject the subject of the matching context item
  • oldValue the previous value of the context item
  • newValue the new value of the context item

# Lifecycle triggers

Lifecycle triggers are coupled with the lifecycle of the application.

# Application attached

The trigger will fire as soon as the application is attached to a session. It can be used as a kind of initializer. It does not have any configurable parameters or provides any meaningful input to a flow except the type of the event; LIFECYCLE and the param ATTACHED along with the application which was the cause of the trigger.

# Application detached

This trigger will fire when the application selected is detached (also happens when the application itself exits).

# Manatee started

When Manatee starts it will trigger any flows with this trigger – this can also be used to start an application as Manatee will start an application before running any of its flows.

# Browser navigation

This trigger will fire when an attached browser-based application is navigated to a matching url. Both a from and a to url matching regex must be configured.

# Triggers from services

# Mail

The mail trigger will trigger a flow whenever one or more mails matching the configured preconditons are received. It must be configured with the mail service (which in turn contains server connection details).

Only unread mails can trigger a flow and as soon as a trigger runs it will mark the mail as read. This ensures that the same flow (on the same machine) does not run multiple times on the same mail. In general the same principle applies across machines, but it is not guaranteed.

# Configurable parameters

  • service the mail service to connect to
  • fromAddress the address to match with the sender of the mail (regular expression)
  • toAddress the address to match with the recipient of the mail (regular expression)
  • ccAddress the address to match with the (cc) recipient of the mail (regular expression)
  • subject the subject to match (regular expression)
  • body the body to match (regular expression)
  • attachments the attachments to match (regular expression)

# Parameters to flow

  • from the senders address
  • to the recipient address
  • cc the cc address
  • subject the subject
  • body the body
  • attachments the attachments

# Serial port

The serial port trigger will trigger a flow whenever a message is received from the device, which matches the trigger message pattern.

# Configurable parameters

  • Serial port the port to monitor for messages
  • Message pattern the pattern to match incoming messages against (regular expression). Note that this trigger is currently limited to matching inbound data interpreted as text according to the encoding selected in the chosen serial port service. For devices with binary protocols, this may make the regular expressions a bit harder to write. To match the byte sequence 0x02 0x06 0x03, the regular expression \x02\x06\x03 can be used. For binary protocol devices, the encoding selector in the serial port service should be left empty.

# Parameters to flow

  • message the matched message as a string

# Previous messages

The serial port service keeps track of the most recently received messages from the device. Through this mechanism a flow can inspect the messages received prior to the triggering message. Details and examples can be seen in the service document.

# Message queue (MQ)

The message queue trigger will trigger a flow whenever one or more messages matching the configured preconditions are received. Each MQ trigger must be set up to use an MQ service.

# Configurable parameters

  • Message queue the MQ service subscription to monitor for messages
  • Message pattern the pattern to match incoming messages against (regular expression).
  • Claim pattern the pattern to match the JWT token of incoming messages against (regular expression). This makes it possible to authenticate the origin of incoming messages before letting them trigger a flow. Obtain a valid token by contacting sirenia support.
  • Reply expected whether to reply to the sender of a triggering message with the result of the flow invocation or not. This enables manatee to function as a kind of Remote Procedure Call server.

# Parameters to flow

  • message the body of the triggering message

Code extracting the triggering message:

var triggerParams = JSON.parse(Inputs['[eu.sirenia]Manatee.In.TriggerParams']);
var triggeringMessage = triggerParams.message;

Debug.showDialog(triggeringMessage);

See the service documentation for a detailed list of services.

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