Automic Workload Automation

You can set the combo box Property "Data reference" to {name of VARA}.

2) create a script that will pull the Key value from (eg) VARA.STATIC.BIND, and insert the value in another variable (eg: VARA.KEY, and the use VARA.KEY in your ComboBox.  

:SET &CNT# = 1 :SET &HND#=PREP_PROCESS_VAR(VARA.STATIC.BIND) :PROCESS &HND# :   SET &KEY# = GET_PROCESS_LINE(&HND#,1) :SET &CNT# = FORMAT(&CNT#) :PUT_VAR VARA.KEY, &CNT#,&KEY# :SET &CNT# = ADD(&CNT#, 1) :ENDPROCESS

Christine Chavez said:

Unfortunately, you can't populate the combobox with they Key values or value 2, 3, and so on

I think this should be possible, using an EXEC VARA that calls a SCRI that parses the original VARA and creates a new data sequence with the values from the desired column. I’m trying to do something similar, but have run into an roadblock: CREATE_PROCESS returns $PROCESS02 instead of contents of data sequence.

Michael_Lowry
Wouldn't your suggestion be sort-of similar to workaround #2? 

2) create a script that will pull the Key value from (eg) VARA.STATIC.BIND, and insert the value in another variable (eg: VARA.KEY, and the use VARA.KEY in your ComboBox.  

Christine Chavez said:

Michael_Lowry
Wouldn't your suggestion be sort-of similar to workaround #2? 

2) create a script that will pull the Key value from (eg) VARA.STATIC.BIND, and insert the value in another variable (eg: VARA.KEY, and the use VARA.KEY in your ComboBox.  

Right, except that with my approach, there’s no temporary VARA object to remove afterward.

I took a stab at the method I suggested. First, I created a static VARA object with values in two columns: Next, I made an EXEC VARA:
https://us.v-cdn.net/5019921/uploads/editor/4j/91x7u09ir5sg.png" width="541">
Finally, I made the SCRI that the EXEC VARA will execute. Here was my first attempt:

:SET &Hnd1# = PREP_PROCESS_VAR(UC0.MAL.CREATE_PROCESS_TESTS.VARA_STATIC,,,2)
:PSET &Result# = SAVE_PROCESS(&Hnd1#)
:CLOSE_PROCESS &Hnd1#
:CLOSE_PROCESS &Result#

The idea is to  use PREP_PROCESS_VAR to create a data sequence containing only the values from column 2, and then simply to save this data sequence for use by the SCRI. When I clicked the Preview button, here were the results:
Obviously, something is not right. I tried specifying a different value than 2 for the Column argument, and also tried omitting this argument altogether. Neither made a difference. Next, I tried using CREATE_PROCESS with the DUPLICATE option, to create a copy of the original data sequence:

:SET &Hnd1# = PREP_PROCESS_VAR(UC0.MAL.CREATE_PROCESS_TESTS.VARA_STATIC,,,)
:SET &Hnd2# = CREATE_PROCESS(DUPLICATE,&Hnd1#)
:PSET &Result# = SAVE_PROCESS(&Hnd2#)
:CLOSE_PROCESS &Hnd1#
:CLOSE_PROCESS &Hnd2#
:CLOSE_PROCESS &Result#

The results were unchanged. (Note by the way, that I am using :PSET instead of :SET. This is important. With just :SET, no results at all are returned.)

It seems that the Column argument of PREP_PROCESS_VAR is ignored, or does not work as I would expect it to.

Next, I went ahead and did it the long way, parsing each line of the original STATIC VARA, extracting the value from the desired column, and one-by-one, putting these values into a new data sequence:

:Set &Counter# = 0
:SET &Hnd1# = PREP_PROCESS_VAR(UC0.MAL.CREATE_PROCESS_TESTS.VARA_STATIC,,,)
:PROCESS &Hnd1#
:  SET &Counter# = &Counter# + 1
:  IF &Counter# = 1
:    SET &Hnd2# = CREATE_PROCESS(NEW)
:    SET &RC# = PUT_PROCESS_LINE(&Hnd2#,"Value2")
:  ENDIF
:  SET &Column2Value# = GET_PROCESS_LINE(&Hnd1#,3)
:  SET &RC# = PUT_PROCESS_LINE(&Hnd2#,&Column2Value#)
:ENDPROCESS
:IF &Counter# > 0
:  PSET &Result# = SAVE_PROCESS(&Hnd2#)
:ENDIF
:CLOSE_PROCESS &Hnd1#
:CLOSE_PROCESS &Hnd2#
:CLOSE_PROCESS &Result#

This worked. Here are the results:
Note that there is an extra PUT_PROCESS_LINE command in the first iteration of the PROCESS loop (when the counter is equal to 1). This is important, because it inserts column headings.

This solution is a bit verbose, and I had hoped to find a more elegant approach that did not require creating extra data sequences. I do not know why the Column argument of PREP_PROCESS_VAR does not work. Has anyone else had success with this?

And by the way, when this EXEC VARA is used as the data source for a combo box element in a prompt set, one of the duplicate '1' values is omitted, and only one of them appears in the list. I suppose this is because the items in a combo box list must be unique.

Hi guys,

i think there might be a simpler (scriptless) workaround using 3 different VARA Objects:

1. yourSTATIC VARA object (with the keys and columns),
2. anemptySTATIC VARA (no key, no column)
3. aMULTIVARA

Here is how it works:

Consider the following STATIC VARA from which we want to use Column 3 (Value 2) in a Promptset drop down box:
https://us.v-cdn.net/5019921/uploads/editor/zu/9wkjazuc8a3r.png" width="470">

Create an empty STATIC VARA:
https://us.v-cdn.net/5019921/uploads/editor/do/1pkd5ahvsgax.png" width="471">

Now create a VARA of type MULTI with:

• your data-filled VARA as"Variable 1",
• the empty VARA as"Variable 2",
• "Union" as theoperation,
• aResult Formatof{3}(=> extract the 3rd overall column of the union, "key" being {1}, "value 1" being {2} etc..)

https://us.v-cdn.net/5019921/uploads/editor/xv/i8fzu5u93n4r.png" width="851">

Now, use this MULTI VARA in your promptset drop down box:

https://us.v-cdn.net/5019921/uploads/editor/yv/a1pl1b5zbucu.png" width="802">

=> column "Value 2" is now available in the dropdown menu :)

brendan_sapience_automic
Thanks. But with this method, how do you get the combobox to display the "Key" value of your static variable? In your case, "1", "2", "3" ?

I guess I should rename this discussion to "How to display the Key value of a VARA in a ComboBox" because that was the customer's specific question :)

The script below will extract the Key value and insert in a new VARA. Is there a way to do this without using a script?

:SET &CNT# = 1 :SET &HND#=PREP_PROCESS_VAR(VARA.STATIC.BIND) :PROCESS &HND# :   SET &KEY# = GET_PROCESS_LINE(&HND#,1) :SET &CNT# = FORMAT(&CNT#) :PUT_VAR VARA.KEY, &CNT#,&KEY# :SET &CNT# = ADD(&CNT#, 1) :ENDPROCESS

Ahhhh, thanks for the clarification Christine_Chavez_6412, totally missed that you were after the Key!

K, so to get the key in your combobox, simply modify the MULTI VARA to have a "Result Format" of {1}:

https://us.v-cdn.net/5019921/uploads/editor/cr/84tf68f3e70q.png" width="1600">

that will give you access to the keys!

(note, i quickly replaced my KEYS (1,2,3) by KEY1, KEY2, KEY3 to better illustrate it.)

Thanks brendan_sapience_automic. Definitely a simpler approach than the one I had.

Brendan Sapience said:

...so to get the key in your combobox, simply modify the MULTI VARA to have a "Result Format" of {1}...

With your solution as a starting point, I had an idea for a way to dynamically select different subsets of the data, by setting the result format dynamically, e.g., by placing the object variable &RESULT_FORMAT# in the Result Format field. I wonder if this would work.

ah, i wonder if that field accepts variables? 

did you try? that would be an interesting test indeed!

Brendan Sapience said:

ah, i wonder if that field accepts variables? 

did you try? that would be an interesting test indeed!

I haven't tried it yet. Based on the fact that curly braces are used in a special way to specify result formats, I would guess that variable resolution is not performed for that field. Either that, or special parsing was developed just for this field.

As expected, variables are not resolved in the Result Format field. I tested it in AE version 12.0.0+build.3456.