AX3005

Copying plan files to other file groups

You can copy plan files from one file group to another. This feature is typically used to support specialized solutions for requirements such as:

  • When plan files must be moved from one file group to another, to continue planning for them in a different file group—for example, when a capital request spans multiple years and must be copied to the next year of planning.

  • When you want to use a plan file from one file group as a "starter template" for a new, similar request in a different file group.

The available features for copying plan files between file groups depend on whether the file groups are standard file groups or on-demand file groups. It is not possible to copy plan files between a standard file group and an on-demand file group—both source and target file groups must be the same type.

Copying between standard file groups

For standard file groups, there are two methods of copying plan files:

  • Plan files can be copied manually using the Copy Plan Files feature. This feature is only available to administrators and to users with the Create Plan Files security permission. Using this feature, plan files can be copied in bulk to a target file group.

  • Plan files can be copied automatically upon completion of a workflow stage, using stage actions. For example, when a user completes a stage of a workflow, the plan file will be automatically copied to a specified target file group. This copy action does not require the user to have any permission to the target file group. This copy action is only available in the legacy workflow feature. For more information, see Setting up stage actions.

You can copy plan files to any file group that shares the same plan code tableThe table that contains the list of plan codes for a file group. Generally, each code in the table will have a plan file for developing plan data.. It is up to the solution designer to ensure that the file groups are set up appropriately so that the copied plan files work as expected in the new file group.

IMPORTANT: The target file group must contain templates with the same names as the templates used to create the original plan files, or else the copy action will not be allowed. When the plan files are copied, the copies will refer to the templates in the target file group as their source templates, and those source templates will be used to provide lists of Axiom queries for Process Plan Files, and lists of print views for Print Plan Files.

To copy plan files to another file group:

  1. In the Explorer task pane, expand the file group that you want to copy plan files from, and then double-click Copy Plan Files.

    The Copy Plan Files dialog opens. By default, the Source File Group is set to the file group in which you launched Copy Plan Files.

  2. For Destination File Group, select the file group that you want to copy the plan files to.

    You can select any file group that uses the same plan code table as the source file group. If no file groups are listed, then no eligible file groups are available.

  3. Select the plan files that you want to copy to the destination file group.

    You must have at least read access to the files in the source file group, and read/write access to the files in the destination file group.

    You can select individual plan files, or select the check box in the header to select all plan files. You can also use Axiom grid features to filter the list. If you select the check box in the header after filtering the list, only the currently-displayed plan files will be selected.

  4. Click OK.

    A confirmation dialog informs you of the number of plan files that will be created or overwritten in the destination file group. Click OK to continue.

The selected plan files are copied to the destination file group. If you want those copied plan files to be refreshed with data using the settings of the new file group and their data saved to the database, then you must use Process Plan Files.

Copying between on-demand file groups

For on-demand file groups, the Copy On Demand Plan Files feature can be used to copy plan files between file groups. This feature is available as follows:

  • The Copy On Demand Plan Files command in the Command Library can be used in a custom task pane or ribbon tab to provide copy functionality to the intended users. For more information, see Copy On Demand Plan Files command.

  • The Copy On Demand Plan Files task in Scheduler can be used to copy plan files as part of executing a Scheduler job. You can schedule copy operations as needed, and you can trigger copy operations using RunEvent (such as from an Axiom form). For more information, see Scheduler task: Copy On Demand Plan Files.

When setting up the command or Scheduler job, you specify a source file group and a target file group. The copy feature does not enforce any relationship between the two file groups other than they must both be on-demand file groups. It is up to the solution designer to ensure that the copied plan files will operate as expected in the target file group.

The following is an example of how this functionality works:

  1. The user executes the Copy On Demand Plan Files command from a custom task pane or ribbon tab.

  2. A dialog displays a list of plan files in the source file group. The user can select one or more plan files to copy to the target file group.
  3. When the user clicks OK to copy, one or more new records are created in the target file group, and the selected plan files are copied for use with those new records. Depending on the options enabled for the command, the new plan files may be saved after the copy in order to execute a save-to-database, or a data copy utility may be run in order to copy the necessary data.

When executing the command using Scheduler, in most cases you will specify a filter to determine the plan files to copy. This filter can be hard-coded in the task, or you can use job variables to dynamically change the plan files to copy.