"Generate Changes" button for an individual object

Hey Adrian,

Thanks for the suggestion. I have added it to our backlog.

Hi Matt.

If I had to pick just one feature to get added to UNIFYBroker, this would be the one I'd choose.

To expand on this: right now, if I make a change to a transformation during development (or while working on an existing customer's install) and I want to test it, I have to generate changes for every entity in the Adapter.

This can take a long time when there are a lot of entities.  And if working out that transform change is an iterative process I might have to do it many times until I get it right... and each time I have to wait for a complete Generate Changes on all entities, multiplying the wait time.

Any approach that would let me do this would be greatly appreciated - even if it's just a beta API call (rather than having to do all the work of adding it as a feature in the UI).

Thanks.

Hey Adrian,

Can you check the comment on this ticket and see how close this is to doing what you're after?:

https://unifyvoice.userecho.com/communities/6/topics/4139-test-harness-for-adapter-and-link-powershell-transformations 

Thanks Matt,

Bob asked me about that call some time ago (in a somewhat different context), and this was my response to him:

Having read through all the API swagger docs I was aware of the Entity/SimulateTransformations call, but have not used it.

It’s not clear if it can simulate reverse transformations (i.e. for update/export operations) or just old-style forward transformations. Since reverse translations are a relatively new feature and there’s no obvious was to tell it to do them it may not.

There are a lot of unanswered usage questions which aren’t addressed by the API swagger doc, so it will be necessary go through the usual process of testing it out to find out what it actually does and what the various parameters and responses are and what they look like.

Before the transformation simulation functionality will be useful for us I’ll also need to build something for entity query (using the SearchEntities API call), in order to be able to determine the IDs for passing to it. Support for API Entity functionality in my PowerShell module is on my TODO list, but it’s not something I’ve had a need for or gotten around to yet.

In this context, SimulateTransformations wouldn't help us to test UNIFYBroker/Plus operation (i.e. newly transformed data through to the Locker and beyond) since (presumably) the transformed data doesn't get committed on a simulation.  But it would still be a little bit helpful, so I'll see if I can get go-ahead to look into it trying it out.

No that's correct - it doesn't get committed on a simulation. It's always better to test in isolation anyway - make sure the transformations work as intended, and then generate changes to apply them to your context to see downstream impact. I only brought this feature up because of your most recent comment (making changes to a transformation and wanting to test it). The underlying ask of a generate changes for a single entity is still valid. 

There's not a lot of documentation on this endpoint currently, since it was a last minute thing added in 5.3 that wasn't fully integrated (hence its not on the UI). So feel free to ask questions about it or give it a test and see how you go with it - it's something on the list to refine for future releases.

In terms of EntityID's, you can get those from the UI through the existing Entity Search view.