Step properties

In the context of plug-ins and steps, properties are values that the step's command uses. Step properties are defined with the property element.

The Create File step has three properties:

• The file property contains the name of the file that the command creates. This property is represented as a text box in the process designer
• The contents property contains the content of the file. This property is represented by a text-area box, which can contain a large amount of data
• The overwrite property specifies whether the file can overwrite an existing file. This property is represented by a check box in the process designer

These properties are displayed in the dialog box that opens when the step is added to a process. The other properties in the dialog are displayed for every step. Post processing is discussed later. Property values can be entered into the dialog box by the process designer at design time, or can be provided at run time by the user.

You can configure most properties with the property-ui child element (the selectBox type requires the value child element also). Default values can be defined when you create the step.

In addition to a step's own properties, a command has access to properties that are set earlier by other steps within the process, and to properties set by the process.

Step property values become unavailable after the process ends. Properties that are defined at run time are combined with the properties that were defined earlier and together are sent to the agent. Earlier properties (those properties that were defined outside the current process) are retrieved from the database. The way properties are processed and consumed is discussed further in the next section.