Glossary

Defines a set of operations on  the values of data in a stream.

 stream item. A stream action can be applied from the stream view properties.

• Understanding Streams
• Action properties

Used to group actions into drop-down lists or display a single Glossary#streamAction as a button. In both cases Action Buttons are displayed on the top of Glossary#streamView .

Aggregate Attributes define the aggregated properties that are available when data is read from an aggregating Glossary#pipe.

• Aggregate Attribute

Allow users to logically represent a business process / control flow using configured PhixFlow objects, e.g. streams, file collectors etc.

• Analysis Model

The Analysis Engine is initiated whenever the generation of a Stream Set is requested. Users can do this by configuring Analysis Tasks in a Glossary#taskPlan.

• Analysis Task

A task to archive Glossary#streamSet from Glossary#stream with archiving configured on them.

• Archive Task

An object that contains an ordered list of other objects.

• Arrays

PhixFlow provides an extensive list of Attribute Functions which may be used within all expression strings.

• Attribute Functions

Details of an individual audited action performed on a PhixFlow object.

A summary of all audited action performed on PhixFlow objects. Can be viewed in the System Console.

• Audit Summary

PhixFlow objects that have auditing switched on to allow for any changes in the system to be tracked.

Candidate sets are a fundamental concept of function calculation in PhixFlow.

Every time a function calculation is carried out, all the required input data is brought together and organised into sets of data - one set for each Key group.

The Key groups are worked out using the Pipe Grouping Attributes defined on input Pipe for each Stream.

The database that stores the PhixFlow schema and all processed data

A Chart displays data in table form, or in one of a number of graphs styles.

Refers to the comparator types that can be used in a filter, e.g. greater than, starts with.

A generic term for a Glossary#fileCollector, a Glossary#databaseCollector, or an Glossary#httpCollector.

A context menu appears above each Glossary#modelElement when the user hovers over it in a model view. This menu shows all of the actions that can be performed on that element.

A CSV (comma-separated variable) file is a plain text file where each line in the file consists of a number of fields separated by commas ','. If fields may contain spaces, commas or double quotes, they should be enclosed in double quotes '"'. A double quote may be represented by 2 double quotes.

A CSV file is always encoded using a specific character set. On Windows this is typically Cp1282, and on Unix/Linux US7ASCII, though the following are sometimes used: UTF-8, UTF-16, ISO-8859-1.

A CSV file typically has an extension '.csv'.

A CSV file can be created directly in a plain text editor (e.g. Wordpad/Notepad), in Excel (by saving as a CSV), or by some other application.

Whenever an analysis model is run it will carry out a number of tasks e.g. read a number of files, generate a number of stream sets, export a number of files. It is possible to configure an analysis model so that in a single analysis session it will actually run several times. When a model is configured in this way, each time it runs is termed a 'cycle' and all of the items processed or generated during that cycle (i.e. the files processed, stream sets created, files exported etc) are flagged with the cycle number. This cycle number is visible in the Log File for that analysis run on each of the relevant tabs showing files and stream sets processed.

The most common reason for configuring a model in this way is to allow a number of files to be processed in a single analysis session but to have the results from each file saved in a separate stream set. In this way, whenever a file fails to process the user can simply rollback the stream sets associated with that file rather than rolling back all of the stream sets associated with all of the files for the whole analysis session.

To achieve this, a model is configured with a push pipe from the final stream in the model pointing back to itself. This push pipe is then given positive offsets. The file collector at the start of the model is then configured to process a single file at a time. When this model is run the file collector will read in one file, process it to create a stream set (or a chain of stream sets if there are several streams in the model) and will flag the file processed, the stream sets generated and any associated output files with the cycle number 1. When the last stream in the model has finished producing its stream set it will send a notification to itself down the push pipe. This notification (because of the positive offsets) will be taken as a signal to create another stream set which will effectively cause the whole model to run again. This second run of the model will be deemed to be cycle 2 and all files processed, stream sets produced or files output will be flagged with this cycle number.

When later viewing the log files the user can see which items were processed in which cycle and can choose how many cycles to roll back. In the case where the last file processed was unsuccessful the user can therefore choose to only roll back the last cycle.

• Rollback or Repeat Cycles

A dashboard allows the user to gather into a single view a set of charts. This grouping of related reports and statistics provides the user with preconfigured overviews of selected areas, making all the data that is required to view and monitor the health of the system both accessible and easy to read.

• Dashboard Details

A Data Grid is a particular type of view which displays the data in a table format.

• Stream View

Used to gather information from a external database, defined as a PhixFlow Datasource. It holds the SQL that will be sent to the datasource to retrieve data.

• Database Collector Details

Used to write information from PhixFlow to external databases.

• Database Exporter Details

Defines a connection to an external database.

• Datasource Details

Allows for multiple connections for individual database instances to be configured for a specific Glossary#datasource.

A Directed Pipe is used as a secondary input to a Merge Stream.

Primary Pipes to a Merge are implemented by reading all input records from all Primary Pipes in a single operation, ordered by the Group-By fields. The primary pipes determine the key values of the Candidate Sets that will be generated.

A Directed pipe is implemented after the Primary Pipes have run, by reading records matching each Candidate Set grouping key in turn. This can result in a significant performance improvement in certain circumstances.

A Pipe can be marked as a Directed Pipe on the Pipe Details / Advanced tab.

• Pipe Details

An expression returns a value, usually by manipulating or transforming input data, although some expressions can be very simple: e.g. the expression "hello" always returns the string "hello" and requires no input.

• Introduction to scripting

Describes the structure, content, naming patterns and location of files of data to be imported into PhixFlow.

• File Collector Details

The data columns that a File Collector expects to be present when importing a file.

Used to write information from PhixFlow to external files.

• File Exporter Details

Filters are made up of a set of clauses; each clause in turn contains a number of conditions. These conditions must be satisfied for data to be passed through a pipe or returned in a filtered list.

• Filter Details

If you move your mouse pointer to the bottom of the screen the PhixFlow Form Bar will appear. Contains links to all open forms (both open and minimised).

• Form Bar

A file system that is reachable via the FTP protocol.

• FTP Site Details

Groups the pipe data into candidate set, forms key for candidate set. However if data is coming from database or file collector, order by fields need to be specified in the collector SQL.

• Group By Attribute

Hypertext transfer protocol - the language of the internet. In the context of PhixFlow, it means using standard internet communication as means of importing and exporting data.

• Glossary#httpCollector
• Glossary#httpExporter

Collect data from an Glossary#httpDatasource.

• HTTP Collector

A web site, web service or some other target that allows XML, HTML or text data to be collected from it, or exported to it, over HTTP. Data is collected from an HTTP Datasource using a Glossary#httpCollector , and exported to an HTTP Datasource using a Glossary#httpExporter.

An HTTP Datasource Instance must define at least one Glossary#httpDatasourceInstance.

An HTTP Datasource Instance may define multiple Glossary#xmlNamespace to support Glossary#xPath expressions on Glossary#httpCollector .

• HTTP Datasource

An HTTP Datasource Instance provide a default username, password and URL to an Glossary#httpCollector or Glossary#httpExporter.

• HTTP Datasource Instance

Export data to an Glossary#httpDatasource.

• HTTP Exporter

Pre-defined variables for use in PhixFlow Expressions.

• Internal Variable Definitions

The display language of the user.

• Language

A record of a task or action completed in PhixFlow, including any messages output and details about stream sets created.

• System Console

Within each log list, log messages are output by the Analysis Engine as it performs analysis.

• Log Message Details

A macro is a user-defined function that can be called from other Glossary#expression.

A macro can be called with parameters. These parameters are available within the body of the macro as $arg.

• Macro Details

The individual objects that make up an Glossary#analysisModel e.g. streams, file collectors etc. These elements are added via drag and drop controls and context menus.

Where a list is displaying more data than can be viewed in the display grid, paging allows the user to scroll through the whole list, e.g. log messages, Stream Set data.

A period is set on a Stream. This can be either a regular period, or variable. There are four possible settings:

• Daily: generate or collect data every day.
• Monthly: generate or collect data every month.
• Variable: generate or collect data since the more recent run of the stream to the current date.
• Transactional: allows multiple users to run independent analysis tasks at the same time.

A pipe is a connector that links two elements in a PhixFlow model.

• Pipe Details

Privileges are used to define what actions can be performed in PhixFlow; see Privileges.

A record set is a list of records returned, usually by a pipe, where each record consists of named attributes, each with a value.

• Arrays and Record Sets

Represents an action that once completed will cause the enclosing view to be refreshed.

• Stream Action

Roles represent the type of access required to do specific tasks (e.g. Designer, Operator etc). Roles are assigned to User Groups (or vice versa); see Roles.

Deletes a specified set of Glossary#streamSet from a Glossary#stream and updates the tidemarks for that Glossary#stream.

• Rollback

A Rollback Task can be configured to rollback one or more streams. Users can do this by configuring Rollback Tasks in a Glossary#taskPlan.

A Sequence is used to generate a numeric sequence of values.

The Sequence lets you define the properties of the sequence e.g. the starting value.

The nextValue function returns the next value in the sequence each time it is called.

The curValue function returns the most recent value returned by nextValue.

• Sequence Details

SQL query used to retrieve data from, or SQL or PL/SQL statement used to update data in, a Glossary#datasource.

• Database Collector
• Database Exporter

Defines a set of updates to the values of a stream item. A stream action can be applied from the stream view properties.

• Understanding Streams
• Action properties

Defines the basic Stream operation. The type of stream may be aggregate, calculate, calculate by set, cartesian or merge.

• Understanding Streams