Input Monitoring

Altair Forum User

Hi,

I am trying to set up an standard process using input monitoring The input file has the date in the name so I needed to use a macro for the date but it appears that monitoring doesn't work with macros, is that correct?

Automator v14.3.4.23113

Altair Forum User

I just tried setting up the same scenario and it appears you might be right.  Wildcards seem to be okay, but macros are not being evaluated.  I had a file named 20180608classic.prn.  My input file and monitoring are set to 201806&[dd]classic.prn.  Never picked up.  If I renamed the file itself to 201806&[dd]classic.prn, then monitoring did kick off, but the process would fail because Automator did evaluate the input to be 20180608classic.prn.  I will enter a support ticket to see if this is a bug or by design.

 

As a workaround, I was able to use wildcards in the monitored file specification, so I could enter *classic*.prn which allowed Automator to kick off the process, and when the process runs, it only picked up the file with the correct date, 20180608classic.prn.  Hopefully this work around is suitable for now.

 

I will update this topic once I head something from support.

Altair Forum User

Altair Forum User said:

I just tried setting up the same scenario and it appears you might be right.  Wildcards seem to be okay, but macros are not being evaluated.  I had a file named 20180608classic.prn.  My input file and monitoring are set to 201806&[dd]classic.prn.  Never picked up.  If I renamed the file itself to 201806&[dd]classic.prn, then monitoring did kick off, but the process would fail because Automator did evaluate the input to be 20180608classic.prn.  I will enter a support ticket to see if this is a bug or by design.

 

As a workaround, I was able to use wildcards in the monitored file specification, so I could enter *classic*.prn which allowed Automator to kick off the process, and when the process runs, it only picked up the file with the correct date, 20180608classic.prn.  Hopefully this work around is suitable for now.

 

I will update this topic once I head something from support.

Thanks Chris. I figured I would have to incorporated the wildcards but was hoping to use the macro as it is more detailed.

Altair Forum User

From support and development, macro usage is not allowed for monitoring path.

Although there are no guarantees, this feature has been requested to be added to v15.2.