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Project operations - Variables

User Management Resource Administrator intensively uses variables. Variables are placeholders for actual values. A variables consists of 2 items:

1. The name of the variable

2. The value of the variable.

By default, variable names are enclosed with %-characters. The %-characters are considered part of the variable name. Examples of variable name are: %FirstName%, %Domain%, %OU%. The value of a variable does not always exist and may change in time. Typically, a variable name is used in some specification and at run-time, the name of the variable is replaced by the current value of the variable.

In User Management Resource Administrator, variables are used to specify properties of script actions. For more background information on projects, scripts, actions and properties, see Principle of operation. There are 2 main reasons to specifying the value of a property using a variable: Link the input data to the script and simplify the configuration of script action properties.

Link input data to script

If you want to use the value of a column from the input data in a script, you need to use variables. In the example shown, the second column of the input data contains the last name of the user accounts that must be created. For script action Create user (AD) the value of property SurName is set to variable %LastName%. Next, the second column is linked to variable %LastName%.

In the figure shown, the input data contains a column linked to variable %LastName%. The script of the project contains the property SurName in script action Create user (AD). By resolving the variable, the property gets a value that equals the value of the corresponding column of the input data

To link a column to a variable, simply right click in the column header. The popup menu shows all available variables.

Select the variable. This will set the link between the column and the specified variable. With this method, you can only map columns to variables that are in use by properties of the script. When the project is executed, the application reads a line from the input data and sets the value of the specified variable to the value of the column for the current input data line. As an alternative, you can also open the project properties: View, Properties, select tab Variables. Select the column of interest and press Edit. The column properties window is shown.

In this window, you see the name of the column and the current variable linked to the column. The lower section of the window shows all script actions where the specified variable is used. For each action, the property that contains the variable and the property value is shown. To select another variable, open the variable list and select the variable. To select a variable that is not used yet in any script action property, simply type the variable name.

Simplify the configuration of script action properties

Another reason to use variables is to simplify the configuration of multiple properties and script actions even if the value is the same for all input data lines, e.g. each time the script is executed. It is very well possible that multiple action properties of different or the same script actions must obtain the same value. For instance, the name of the domain might be used in multiple properties when creating user accounts. Suppose the name of the domain is fixed and the same constant value for all user accounts that must be created. Then instead of specifying the same domain name for each script action property, a variable %Domain% can be used. This variable should then be specified as the value for all properties that use this specification. In the beginning of the script, the variable assignment action should be specified. Only at this location, the real domain name is specified.

Variable set (advanced)

For advanced script configuration, it is important to understand how and when variables are created and destroyed. This section gives a little background information on this topic. In User Management Resource Administrator, all variables are destroyed when a script is executed. During the execution of a single script, e.g. multiple script actions, a variable set exists. A variable set is a collection of variables. In a variable set each variable has a value. Before the first script action is executed, the columns that are linked to variables a loaded into the variable set. In a simple straightforward script, this variable set will not change.

In a script action one or more of the following changes can be applied to the variable set:

1. A new variable-value pair is added to the variable set: This happens when the property of a script action is configured as an output variable. Upon execution of the script action, the variable set now contains the new variable-value. This mechanism is mainly used when one script action is somehow dependent on a previous action. Example: the action Create user (AD) can generate a unique username of a user account automatically. This name is also used when a home directory is created for the user account. Since the username is not known in advance, it is generated by the action Create user (AD). During the execution of the action, the value of the username is added to the variable set. Subsequent actions can then use the new created variable. In order to add the value of a property as a variable to the variable set, open the properties of the property and select the Output tab. In User Management Resource Administrator, this mechanism is used for a number of properties. For these properties the variables are configured to output the value to a variable by default.

2. The value of a variable is changed: There are a number of script actions available to change the value of a variable: Set variable, Split variable, Format Variable value, Map variable.

Note: as a separate script action, you can insert the Script Action: Log Variables to log all variables of the variable set to the log window. This might help you to setup more advanced scripts.

More information:
Principle of operation
Project operations - Input data
Project operations - Manage script actions
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