Support for old NG templates

Support for old NG templates

Customers, that has a lot of existing NG templates (with extension .itpl, that have been made in InterFormNG), can use these templates in InterFormNG2, if the following limitations are taken into account:

 

1.The templates can be loaded in the library and used in the workflow, but the NG templates cannot be created/changed/updated in the InterFormNG2. You still need the InterFormNG designer to maintain your old NG templates.

2.The workflow of InterFormNG2 is totally different compared to InterFormNG, so the workflow (rules) must be rewritten.

3.The concept of meta data keys, that is used in InterFormNG is not used in InterFormNG2. In InterFormNG2 all meta data keys are handled as variables. The meta data keys are predefined variables in the InterFormNG2 workflows. If you have a match between a variable name and the name of a meta data key, then the output might be unpredictable.

4.In InterFormNG you can use email templates of the formats .html and .rtf. In InterFormNG2 you can not use .rtf files - only .vm and .html, so you will need to convert .rtf files into either .vm or .html.

5.In InterFormNG email templates the variables (which are really meta data keys) are referenced in the format @[variable]. This is not supported in InterFormNG2, so you need to convert these references to variables into the format: $variable (the name of the variable with a preceding $-sign as internally in InterFormNG2.

6.Workflow variables are available as meta data keys in the InterFormNG templates.

7.The workflow and the InterFormNG template can exchange data via the workflow variables/meta data keys in this way: If you set any workflow variable in the workflow prior to the call of the InterFormNG template, then the InterFormNG template can 'see' these variables as meta data keys. It also works the other way around: Meta data keys, that are set in InterFormNG templates are available in the workflow subtree after the InterFormNG template has been called.

8.When you merge input xml files with an InterFormNG template, then you can use any of the normal create workflow components - both basic and shortcut. There is also one workflow component, From ITPL to intermediate format, that can only be used for InterFormNG (.itpl) templates.

9.You can still set the dynamic output via meta data keys in your NG templates, but you need to build up each output function in a workflow. You can consider to build a generic workflow to handle most output generated with InterFormNG templates. Introduction to such a workflow is included here.

10.Notice, that if you have been splitting XML files in InterFormNG, then you should notice, that the special $detail solution supported in InterFormNG xslt stylesheets is not supported in InterFormNG2. In InterFormNG2 a clean way to do the same is possible - without this special $detail solution.

11.Spooled file support in InterFormNG2 is limited to InterFormNG2 templates.

12.It is recommended to convert InterFormNG templates into InterFormNG2 templates, as the support for InterFormNG templates in InterFormNG2 will stop at some point in the future.


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