12 Exporting data to files

By the end of this chapter you will be able to:

• Set up a file exporter

In this exercise you will create an export of the customer summary report, to a file:

• In your model, add a new file exporter:
  • Hover over the stream Customer Summary by Region, and press  - Add a new File Exporter
  • Give the new exporter the Name: Send Customer Summary Report
  • Press 
  • You will now see the new file exporter on the modelling pane

Save your model layout.
As well as exporting the file to a directory on the PhixFlow server, you will email the file to yourself. Before you set this up, you need to update the user Train with your email address:

• In the top-right hand of the application, go to the User menu
• Select My User Details
• Update the Email Address with your email address
• Press  to save your changes

To complete configuration of the file exporter:

• Double-click on the new file exporter icon on your model view
• Tick the flag Enabled
• In the field File Name (Expr) enter the value:

"customerSummaryByRegion.txt"

• In the field Output Directory (Expr) enter:

"customerReports/customerSummaryByRegion"

• Tick the flag Overwrite existing file
• Tick the flag Header
  
• Go to the Send By Email section, and set the following:
  
  • Email from: system@PhixFlow.com
  • Subject Expression: "Export of customerSummaryByRegion.txt at " + now()
  • Message Expression: "Please find file customerSummaryByRegion.txt attached. Generated at " + now()
  • Attach File: tick
• Go to the User Recipients section
  • Press  - Show the list of Users
  • Drag the user Train (the user you are currently logged in as) into the list of recipients

• In the file exporter configuration form, press 

  Note that the pipe to the file exporter is dotted – this means that it is a Push pipe. When linking a stream to a file exporter you must always use a push pipe. This is because you cannot run a file exporter on its own; it must always be driven from a stream (otherwise, it has no data to process).

• Run analysis on the stream Customer Summary by Region
• Check the log messages generated in the console – in particular scroll to the end; you should see messages telling you that a file has been exported
• Now find your file - you should have received an email with the file attached
• The file has also been exported to the PhixFlow server