We've been quiet on the progress of the upcoming Automations feature, so it's time for a much needed update!
Once we started working on Automations we identified structural improvements that could be made to WebApps/Module to make this feature build easier and more scalable for the future.
WebApps were built 4 years ago now, and were built using the tech available at the time on platformOS. It's now a good time to apply upgrades to WebApps which take advantage of some of these platformOS changes.
Structural changes
WebApps store information about their structure in Form Configurations. Form Configurations are platformOS specific files. Therefore, if you want to manage this structure at all via CLI then you need to learn how to build Form Configurations.
We're moving away from Form Configurations, and will instead be storing information in JSON format on your sites. This has some benefits:
- Familiarity - JSON format is used across the web, and will be far more familiar to developers than platformOS Form Configuration format will be.
- Speed - We can load JSON data faster than we can fetch and translate Form Config data. This should show speed improvements, both front-end and back-end.
- Future - We can more easily add new features that work with this JSON format, rather than having to use workarounds to work with Form Configurations.
Automations
When editing a WebApp or Module structure you'll be able to see a new tab for 'Automations'. Here you'll select your trigger, and then the action.
Here's a list of triggers that will be available:
- Item create - Admin
- Item update - Admin
- Item delete - Admin
- Item create - Front-end
- Item update - Front-end
- Item delete - Front-end
Here's a list of actions that will be available:
- Email Notification
- To
- From
- CC
- BCC
- Reply To
- Subject
- Template
- Content
- API Call
- To
- Format (e.g. https)
- Request Type (e.g. POST)
- Request Headers
- Content
- Custom Action (You'll be provided a file location to store your custom code in)
- Content
We'll provide a further update in the next couple of weeks.
Matt - thanks so much for the update!
It's really helpful to have the full context surrounding Web App structure, and I can certainly see the benefits of moving to JSON even if it costs some upfront work/time in this process.
Keep us posted!
Thanks for the update Matt...looking forward to see what we can build with this :-)
Matt - Any update on the progress of this? It would be really good if we could get this rolled out to the eCommerce module and orders ASAP to at least bring that up to the same level BC had before it was switched off. Quote a few of our clients need this functionality to run their business and after nearly a year they're getting a bit tetchy to say the least...
What features are you looking to use exactly? Does what's outlined in this post cover it?
The original Road Map post covers pretty much what's required but specifically for one client:
- Ability to edit customer orders, to add or remove products, to add shipping and then be able to email the revised order to the customer.
- Invoice/packing slip printing
- Orders status tick boxes to show pending, payment received, processing, dispatched with auto customer notification emails and ability to add parcel tracking URL to the order dispatched auto customer notification email .
- Product low stock notifications
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